Desperately need disk auditing tool

[J Krugman]

My system has been freezing up a lot lately. I have applied every
upgrade, and every virus and spyware protection software available,
but the problem persists. The next possible diagnosis is that my
hard disk is too full (it's at almost 90% capacity now).

My company's IT desk says that SOP for this is to back-up the entire
disk, and do a fresh install of Windows. This is something that
only they can do (unless I want to pay for Windows out of my own
pocket), because only they have the site-licensed disks, but they
are swamped at the moment, and can't help me until after Thanksgiving,
which is too long for me to wait.

In the meantime, I want to free up as much space in my disk as
possible. Therefore, I am looking for some tool, preferably free
(or very cheap), that will help me identify very large files and
folders that get little use. (I tried Disk Clean, or some such,
but it did not give me sufficiently detailed information; it only
told me that a bazillion bytes' worth of disk had not been used
much in the recent months, and were good candidates for compressing.
I don't want to compress files; I want to delete them. Besides,
when I tried accepting Disk Clean's compression, the machine ground
to a halt. Maybe the disk is so full that it interferes with the
compression program?)

Any recommendations would be much appreciated!

jill

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

My system has been freezing up a lot lately. I have applied every
upgrade, and every virus and spyware protection software available,
but the problem persists. The next possible diagnosis is that my
hard disk is too full (it's at almost 90% capacity now).

My company's IT desk says that SOP for this is to back-up the entire
disk, and do a fresh install of Windows. This is something that
only they can do (unless I want to pay for Windows out of my own
pocket), because only they have the site-licensed disks, but they
are swamped at the moment, and can't help me until after Thanksgiving,
which is too long for me to wait.

In the meantime, I want to free up as much space in my disk as
possible. Therefore, I am looking for some tool, preferably free
(or very cheap), that will help me identify very large files and
folders that get little use. (I tried Disk Clean, or some such,
but it did not give me sufficiently detailed information; it only
told me that a bazillion bytes' worth of disk had not been used
much in the recent months, and were good candidates for compressing.
I don't want to compress files; I want to delete them. Besides,
when I tried accepting Disk Clean's compression, the machine ground
to a halt. Maybe the disk is so full that it interferes with the
compression program?)

Any recommendations would be much appreciated!

jill

Here are a couple of tools that let you find out what's eating up
your disk space:

DriveUse:
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~nulifetv/freezip/freeware/index.html
Bullet Proof Folder sizes: http://www.foldersizes.com/

Some general remarks:
- A disk that's 90% full is close to useless. Good disk management implies
that you put on the brakes at 70% and start taking strong measures
at 80%.
- Your system instability is unlikely to be caused by your full disk.
- PCs are at their best when newly built; from then onwards they
deteriorate.
When the deterioration has gone too far, the PC needs to be rebuilt (or
preferably restored from an image, which can be done in less than one
hour).

I take a snapshot of my PCs once every three months, and I keep the three
most recent snapshots. If my system becomes unstable then I revert to the
most recent snapshot.

 

[J Krugman]

Here are a couple of tools that let you find out what's eating up
your disk space:

DriveUse:
http://members.ozemail.com.au/~nulifetv/freezip/freeware/index.html
Bullet Proof Folder sizes: http://www.foldersizes.com/
Thanks!

Some general remarks:
- A disk that's 90% full is close to useless. Good disk management implies
that you put on the brakes at 70% and start taking strong measures
at 80%.
- Your system instability is unlikely to be caused by your full disk.

Correct. It appears to have been a corrupted hard drive. chkdsk
seems to have taken care of it. (Knock on wood.)

- PCs are at their best when newly built; from then onwards they
deteriorate.
When the deterioration has gone too far, the PC needs to be rebuilt (or
preferably restored from an image, which can be done in less than one
hour).

I've heard this from practically every Windows expert I know. I
find it simply amazing.

<rant>I've managed half a dozen Linux boxes over several years,
and never had this problem. Full rebuilds have never been dictated
by system deterioration. I really don't understand why MS can't

I take a snapshot of my PCs once every three months, and I keep the three
most recent snapshots. If my system becomes unstable then I revert to the
most recent snapshot.

Pardon the ignorant question but how exactly do you make the snapshots? Do you use NTBACKUP.EXE, or do you use some other tool?

jill

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

In <udb3#[email protected]> "Pegasus \(MVP\)"



Correct. It appears to have been a corrupted hard drive. chkdsk
seems to have taken care of it. (Knock on wood.)


I've heard this from practically every Windows expert I know. I
find it simply amazing.

<rant>I've managed half a dozen Linux boxes over several years,
and never had this problem. Full rebuilds have never been dictated
by system deterioration. I really don't understand why MS can't


Pardon the ignorant question but how exactly do you make the snapshots?

Do you use NTBACKUP.EXE, or do you use some other tool?

jill

There are several reasons why Linux is not subject to the type
of deterioration that Windows suffers, e.g.
- People will cheerfully download and run anything that they
can find. They won't eat a sandwich they found in the gutter
but they will double-click any enticing icon.
- Hackers find rich pickings in the world of Windows. The pickings
are far leaner in the world of Linux, so why bother?
- There is an incredibly large number of programs for Windows.
Some of them are poorly written and cause damage.

To create an image, use one of the popular imaging programs
such as DriveImage, Ghost, or Acronis. You can also use zip
if you have a Bart PE CD and if you know how to restore a
PC's boot environment. Ntbackup.exe is not a particularly good
choice because you cannot run it on a blank disk.