Missing HD space.

[Vince]

Just getting going with XP. Just a question.

I have a home built system no junk software packages installed. When I look
at the properties of my hard drive it states that there is 6.8 gig used. In
fact I turned on all options it folder options show hidden show protected
files and show contents of system folders, I did a select all on my c drive
and it shows only 2.63gig of files in total. What is windows doing with the
rest of this space. Could it be space reserved for system restore or other
purpose?

Thanks

 

[JAX]

There is a good chance that the missing space is occupied by System Restore.
By default, "SR" is allocated 12% of the drive size. That is a ridiculous
amount of space on a large HD. Try doing a disk cleanup and select the more
options tab. You will see an option to cleanup SR. Try that and see if that
is what was taking all your drive space. Caution! It will remove all but
your current restore point. You can adjust the amount of space allocated to
SR by going to SR and, on the left hand side of the window, clicking SR
settings. You may want to disable SR for all but your OS drive and limit it
to around 500 MB's. That is enough space to allow around 6 or 7 restore
points. I think that is enough for most users.

HTH, JAX

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

In addition, pagefile.sys (the virtual memory) may also be occupying some of
this space.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org

 

[JAX]

Hi Rick,

Thanks for the input. Of course you are correct. This is a remaining mystery
to me, the more RAM you have, the larger the default PF is. For the sake of
the OP, it is 1.5xRAM. The mystery to me is, why do they set that as default
when the more RAM you have, the less PF you need? (rhetorical question, just
one of those little things)

Cheers, JAX

 

[R. McCarty]

XP is designed to work across as many hardware platforms as
possible. Most systems are still baseline (128-256 Megabytes),
so the 1.5 times is just a fixed rule to setup Virtual Memory.

Perhaps in the future, XP's install will analyze the hardware beyond
HAL's, etc and employ a "High Performance" type of setup.

 

[Vince]

Thanks guys. I am going to have to believe that it has to be the page file
but that seems like a lot of space to me.

I say this because my machine is a clean setup with a xp pro cd not some
restore disk. I can't figure the system restore taking that much space yet
when the os is only days old. Not even a week. That is unless it has put it
in reserve and not being used yet but reporting that it is.

Thanks

 

[JAX]

I think, for most users, the default is just fine. It is dynamic and usually
doesn't occupy enough space to even worry about anyway. If one were to
install a large amount of RAM, they may want to take a look at resetting the
pagefile limits. I know that MS recommends 128 Mb RAM as minimum and a lot
of systems come with XP and only that much RAM. I believe that a general
consensus would be that 256 is more realistic and some games and real
applications even balk at that. (Yes, some people are running on less.)It is
not really MS's responsibility to deal with everyone's hardware
configurations. They have provided, what I consider, a great OS platform
with the flexibility to adjust as needed to suit the individual user.

IMO, JAX

 

[JAX]

Hi Vince,

Each time you install a hotfix, patch or an application, a new restore point
is created. That is the way the system works. By the time you have installed
all of the Windows updates, you will have created some 20+ restore points.
All of your other installations will create more.

JAX

 

[Vince]

Hi Jax:
You know I forgot about that part of all the updates putting in a restore
point.

I have been dealing with XP a couple of years supporting it on 20+ machines
for my job. Just never got in to the little things like this till I got my
own copy this week. Also all of thier machines are from Compaq HP or whoever
and I would not have noticed this because of all the junk they install with
the package deal.

As long as I know where the space went I am happy. Got more space than I
need anyway, really, the machine I just replaced although fairly modern was
using a hard drive from an older machine I bought in the 90's and I only had
3 gigs on there and only used 90% of that. I think 80gig will do a while.

Thanks for the info. Have a great day.

 

[Alex Nichol]

I have a home built system no junk software packages installed. When I look
at the properties of my hard drive it states that there is 6.8 gig used. In
fact I turned on all options it folder options show hidden show protected
files and show contents of system folders, I did a select all on my c drive
and it shows only 2.63gig of files in total.

have Folder Options - View set to show Hidden files, and *not* Hide
Protected mode ones and try again. There are a *lot* of such files,
both in the windows folder, the page file and hibernation file; and
especially the restore points in System Volume Information. The last
are allowed up to 12% of a drive. This may be too much for its own good
on a modern big drive: if it comes out to more than 1 GB I suggest
going to System - System Restore, highlighting the drive, click settings
and slide the setting down to that or a little below

 

[JAX]

Hope I helped, JAX

Hi Jax:
You know I forgot about that part of all the updates putting in a restore
point.

I have been dealing with XP a couple of years supporting it on 20+ machines
for my job. Just never got in to the little things like this till I got my
own copy this week. Also all of thier machines are from Compaq HP or whoever
and I would not have noticed this because of all the junk they install with
the package deal.

As long as I know where the space went I am happy. Got more space than I
need anyway, really, the machine I just replaced although fairly modern was
using a hard drive from an older machine I bought in the 90's and I only had
3 gigs on there and only used 90% of that. I think 80gig will do a while.

Thanks for the info. Have a great day.

 

[JAX]

Hello Larry,

Re-read my post that is included in this one. It should answer your
question.

HTH, JAX

My system has a Partitiion of 5 GB, Drive D. The only thing on this

partitiion is System Restore. I keep getting error message that Drive D is
out of disk space. < 35 mb remaining. Is there someway to correct this, and
if so, how? Also, if I do nothing, what are my exposures? I have turned the
error message off with a registry entry.

 

[Guest]

Jax

When I go to cleanup System Restore, and look at the restore pooints, I can only see (2) and they were for the last couple of days. When I try to go back to the previous months, I can't. Therefore I would only have those two restore points to choose from. What I don't understand is how these two restore points could be consuming 5 gb of space, and, or why I can't see other restore points. Any suggestions?

 

[Vince]

You did help, ya know sometimes even the simple answers hide in our brains.

Vince

 

[Alex Nichol]

When I go to cleanup System Restore, and look at the restore pooints, I can only see (2) and they were for the last couple of days. When I try to go back to the previous months, I can't. Therefore I would only have those two restore points to choose from. What I don't understand is how these two restore points could be consuming 5 gb of space, and, or why I can't see other restore points.

There seem to be times when SR gets into difficulties and loses its
logs. This results in old points still being around but it not knowing
about them. Then the sensible course is to clear it out and let it
start clean. At Control Panel, System, System Restore, Check 'Disable
System Restore, and OK, reboot. Now have Folder Options - View set to
show Hidden files, and *not* Hide Protected mode ones and delete
everything in the System Volume Information folder on each drive

Start SR up again, and I suggest reviewing the settings for each drive.
There is not much point having it enabled on data drives, and on ones
with System or Programs I would reduce the space allotted if more than
say 1GB - I use 500MB, the minimum is 200 which will only handle maybe a
week of points. But the default of 12% of a drive seems too much for
its own good on modern large drives