why does my hard drive space keep going down?

I havent installed anything and for some reason it goes down little by little....
what is going on?

I have a hard drive meter on the side bar, i have a 120gb hard drive..
new out ofthe box it started at 90 gb then i installed some programs I normaly use..drops down to 80.. then installed an extra 2 gb of ram drops too 77..now it just keeps dropping slowly.


do I have to run defrag or disk cleaner?

 

this is on a lenovo t61 with vista basic

 

System restore points. By default it can take up to 15% of your disk space, so open the program up, click on the system protection link and turn it off (uncheck and hit apply) and then on again to reclaim your disk space.

 

Unless you absolutely need that extra space, there's no reason to turn off System Restore. Unused space is wasted space.

 

well im ok with about 70 gb left but im just worried it will just keep going down 6 months from now to were i have a small amount of HD space left..

it usually happens when i make changes on my notebook

 

how can I get to this..thanks

 

yep system restore.

Computer>System Properties>System Protection

 

So if you turn off this you should be ok as long as you think of making restore points manually from then on ?

 

do i uncheck SW_preload(C (system) ??
then apply.. thats the only box thats checked

 

Yes, uncheck the box and apply to clear all restore points. Then re-check if you want and press ok to re-enable it.

 

Plz don't disable system restore. It saves lives, well sorta.

I always keep it turned on, because some day you could mess up your systems somehow and then it could bring it back to normal. It's like never backing up anymore. Just live with the lost space, it worth it if you can repair your machine some day when you need it.

 

It's not really turning it off, it's clearing restore points once in a while so that you can still do a recent backup without losing tons of space.

 

do they only do one restore piont saved?? cause I only see one with the date and time

thanks for the help guys

 

sorry for the double post, but do i get any HD space back??

 

Just leave it alone, if you need the space, it will auto clear out the system restores. Microsoft puts it there by default for a reason...

 

See the " Where is all my Disk Space Going (Vista)" Guide.

 

at this rate I might loose all my HD in a few short months. amI right?

 

or does it stop at a certain piont?? i think after installing some programs I was at 80 gb.....it dropped down to 67 right now

 

From the "Windows Help and How-to":

Delete files using Disk Cleanup

If you want to reduce the number of unnecessary files on your hard disk to free up disk space and help your computer run faster, use Disk Cleanup. It removes temporary files, empties the Recycle Bin, and removes a variety of system files and other items that you no longer need.

1. Open Disk Cleanup by clicking the Start button , clicking All Programs, clicking Accessories, clicking System Tools, and then clicking Disk Cleanup.

2. In the Disk Cleanup Options dialog box, choose whether you want to clean up your own files only or all of the files on the computer. If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type the password or provide confirmation.

3. If the Disk Cleanup: Drive Selection dialog box appears, select the hard disk drive that you want to clean up, and then click OK.

4. Click the Disk Cleanup tab, and then select the check boxes for the files you want to delete.

5. When you finish selecting the files you want to delete, click OK, and then click Delete files to confirm the operation. Disk Cleanup proceeds to remove all unnecessary files from your computer.

The More Options tab is available when you choose to clean files from all users on the computer. This tab includes two additional ways to free even more disk space:

• Programs and Features. Opens Programs and Features in Control Panel, where you can uninstall programs that you no longer use. The Size column in Programs and Features shows how much disk space each program uses.

• System Restore and Shadow Copies. Prompts you to delete all but the most recent restore point on the disk.

System Restore uses restore points to return your system files to an earlier point in time. If your computer is running normally, you can save disk space by deleting the earlier restore points.

In some editions of Windows Vista, restore points can include previous versions of files, known as shadow copies, and backup images created with Windows Complete PC Backup. This information will also be deleted.

 

System restore uses, by default, up to 15% of your hard drive.

 

I'm down to about 3GB of free space, on a 120GB HD. I'm certain a lot of this is not due to files, pictures, or programs that I've added.

If I want to free up some space before trying Vista SP1, is there a way I can delete certain restore points (or backup files, whichever it is doing), that Vista may have created along the way? I imagine I want to keep one of the latest restore points, and one of the earliest. This is on a T60.

I thought restore points didn't take a lot of space. Could this instead be backup files as opposed to restore points, since this is Vista Business? Once in a while I get a notice that Vista wasn't able to complete the scheduled backup. I need to do some more homework on what this thing is trying to do.

 

You can delete all but the latest restore point by right-clicking the C drive, choose Proterties - Disk Cleanup - More Options - Clean up under System Restore and Shadow Copies. Not sure about how to keep the earliest though.

And check these two useful links
Change How Often System Restore Creates Restore Points in Windows Vista_
Reduce System Restore's Disk Usage in Vista

 

Thanks. So far the SP1 update seems to be working ok. It also free'd up some more space in the process.

 

Welcome. You might want to check this thread as well, Finished Installing Windows Vista_ SP1 ? Now Remove All The Junk Files

 

Please be absolutely sure, because i have a 139gb HD and now its 109, i bought it 5 days ago, please tell me aprox. when it will stop decreasing. D:

 

Funny thing is, 15% is 15%. Its not a continuous growth that sucks all your HD space, but rather stops at 15%.

I don't know of any other way to explain it.