Windows Vista is Eating my Hard Drive

[Guest]

I installed Windows Vista (32-bit) on my home desktop and after doing so my
available hard drive space was 211GB free of 226GB. After a couple of hours
on my PC I lost an additional 3GB, and a week after that another 7GB. I've
tried re-installation several times with no success.

The only additional software I've installed are the following:

Microsoft Office Standard 2007 (298MB)
Adobe Reader 8 (115MB)
Windows Live OneCare (16.5MB)
Windows Live Messenger (28.8)
AOL Instant Messenger (11.7)
Flash Player (?)

All these programs barely equal to 500MB.

Is anyone else having a similar problem? Or does anyone have a way to stop
Vista from eating my hard drive?

 

[Conor]

I installed Windows Vista (32-bit) on my home desktop and after doing so my
available hard drive space was 211GB free of 226GB. After a couple of hours
on my PC I lost an additional 3GB, and a week after that another 7GB. I've
tried re-installation several times with no success.

It's the shadow copy service, part of system restore. It keeps several
revisions of a file. Also you'll have many restore points too.

 

[Super Play]

Yup and this can take upto 15% of your disk space.

 

[Chris]

Hi, you can lower the amount system restore is using by following the
instructions here
http://vistasupport.mvps.org/decrease_storage_space-allocated_to_system_restore.htm
Warning, you will reduce the ability of Vista to recover from issues when
the amount of HD space that vista uses is reduced....
ChrisC

 

[Ronnie Vernon MVP]

Just let it eat. It will stop when it's full. <G>

Seriously, it will take a lot of hard drive space, but this is needed for
all of the nifty features like Shadow Copy and an improved System Restore.