freeing space from "System Volume Information" possible?

[Maurice]

Hello:

I like to free to space in my hard disk, so I deleted some unused temporary
files, but also I noticed that I have a huge "System Volume Information"
folder which have a size of 5.1GB.

Can I reduce its size and how? what it contains??

thanks
Maurice

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Hello:

I like to free to space in my hard disk, so I deleted some unused temporary
files,

You can delete *all* your temporary files. Not a problem.

but also I noticed that I have a huge "System Volume Information"
folder which have a size of 5.1GB.

Can I reduce its size and how? what it contains??

It contains restore points. You have a 40GB hard drive? By default,
restore points get 12% of your drive, and that's more than almost
anyone needs. Reduce the amount of space they take as follows:

In Control Panel double click on System, then go to the System Restore
tab. For your C: drive, in Settings, move the slider to the left.

My view is that deciding on the size of the folder that holds
restore points should not be based on a percentage of the hard drive
size, because the size of hard drives varies so much, and therefore
the results of that percentage also vary it a lot. It should be based
on the number of restore points you want to keep.

What you should do is see how many points your current amount gives
you, decide how many you want (I suggest about ten), then do the
arithmetic to see how big to make the percentage. You can then
check again after a couple of weeks to see if it's coming out right,
and adjust it if necessary.

I don't think great precision in how many you have is important.
Somewhere in that week or two range is all you should need.

And by the way, the reason that the Microsoft percentage is so large
is that it was established when the typical size of hard drives was
much smaller.

 

[Maurice]

You can delete *all* your temporary files. Not a problem.




It contains restore points. You have a 40GB hard drive? By default,
restore points get 12% of your drive, and that's more than almost
anyone needs. Reduce the amount of space they take as follows:

In Control Panel double click on System, then go to the System Restore
tab. For your C: drive, in Settings, move the slider to the left.

My view is that deciding on the size of the folder that holds
restore points should not be based on a percentage of the hard drive
size, because the size of hard drives varies so much, and therefore
the results of that percentage also vary it a lot. It should be based
on the number of restore points you want to keep.

What you should do is see how many points your current amount gives
you, decide how many you want (I suggest about ten), then do the
arithmetic to see how big to make the percentage. You can then
check again after a couple of weeks to see if it's coming out right,
and adjust it if necessary.

I don't think great precision in how many you have is important.
Somewhere in that week or two range is all you should need.

And by the way, the reason that the Microsoft percentage is so large
is that it was established when the typical size of hard drives was
much smaller.

thank you, that's what I was looking for!!

Maurice

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

thank you, that's what I was looking for!!

You're welcome. Glad to help.

 

[Gerry]

Maurice


You can create more free space in C by
carrying any of the measures suggested below.

The default allocation to System Restore is 12% on your C partition
which is over generous. I would reduce it to 700 mb. Right click your My
Computer icon on the Desktop and select System Restore. Place the cursor
on your C drive select Settings but this time find the slider and drag
it to the left until it reads 700 mb and exit. When you get to the
Settings screen click on Apply and OK and exit.

A default setting which could be wasteful is that for temporary internet
files, especially if you do not store offline copies on disk. The
default allocation is 3% of drive. Depending on your attitude to offline
copies you could reduce this to 1% or 2%. In Internet Explorer select
Tools, Internet Options, General, Temporary Internet Files, Settings to
make the change. At the same time look at the number of days history is
held.

The default allocation for the Recycle Bin is 10 % of drive. Change to
5%, which should be sufficient. In Windows Explorer place the cursor
on your Recycle Bin, right click and select Properties, Global and
move the slider from 10% to 5%. However, try to avoid letting it get
too full as if it is full and you delete a file by mistake it will
bypass the Recycle Bin and be gone for ever.

If your drive is formatted as NTFS another potential gain arises with
your operating system on your C drive. In the Windows Directory of
your C partition you will have some Uninstall folders in your Windows
folder typically: $NtServicePackUninstall$ and $NtUninstallKB282010$
etc. These files may be compressed or not compressed. If compressed
the text of the folder name appears in blue characters. If not
compressed you can compress them. Right click on each folder and
select Properties, General, Advanced and check the box before Compress
contents to save Disk Space. On the General Tab you can see the amount
gained by deducting the size on disk from the size. Folder
compression is only an option on a NTFS formatted drive / partition.

Select Start, All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, System
Information, Tools, Dr Watson and verify that the box before "Append to
existing log" is NOT checked. This means the next time the log is
written it will overwrite rather than add to the existing file.

The default maximum size setting for Event Viewer logs is too large.
Reset the maximum for each log from 512 kb to 128 kb and set it to
overwrite.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/308427/en-us


Select Start, All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Disk CleanUp to
Empty your Recycle Bin and Remove Temporary Internet Files. Also
select Start, All Programs, accessories, System Tools, Disk CleanUp,
More Options, System Restore and remove all but the latest System
Restore point. Run Disk Defragmenter.


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Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
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