Help Cleaning Out System Disk?

[Guest]

I've been running XP Pro on the same machine for many years and have a bad
case of "file creep." Every System Update, Installer execution etc. leaves
behind a pile of trash. I know it's there to make "uninstallation" easy, but
I'm happy with my system now.

What is safe to delete?

I'm thinking any folder named C:\Windows\$<anything>$\* as well as
C:\Windows\Installer\*.

Correct? Anything more?

Thanks,
Rick

 

[Jupiter Jones [MVP]]

Rick;
The update uninstall files can be safely deleted:
http://www3.telus.net/dandemar/spack.htm

 

[Guest]

Follow up:

What about subfolders of "C:\System Volume Information\?

 

[Guest]

The update uninstall files can be safely deleted:

What about C:\Windows\Installer\*.

 

[Curt Christianson]

Hi Rick,

Those are the System Restore points, and I personally don't mess with them.
If you want to do some cleaning and free up a little disk space, you can
delete all but the last Restore Point by going to "Disk Cleanup", and
looking under the "Other Options" tab. Note that additional restore points
will continue to be added though.

You *can* reduce the amount of space used by SR in "System Properties" and
go to the "System Restore" tab. The default setting I believe is 12% of
your disk space, which today can be a tremendous amount of space on the HD.
That default was conceived when HD's were considerably smaller. Many users
opt to moving the slider so that maybe only 1000 MB are used for SR.

--
HTH,
Curt

Windows Support Center
www.aumha.org
Practically Nerded,...
http://dundats.mvps.org/Index.htm

| Follow up:
|
| What about subfolders of "C:\System Volume Information\?
|
| "Rick489" wrote:
|
| > What is safe to delete?
| >
| > I'm thinking any folder named C:\Windows\$<anything>$\* as well as
| > C:\Windows\Installer\*.
| >
| > Correct? Anything more?

 

[Tony Meloche]

Hi Rick,

Those are the System Restore points, and I personally don't mess with them.
If you want to do some cleaning and free up a little disk space, you can
delete all but the last Restore Point by going to "Disk Cleanup", and
looking under the "Other Options" tab. Note that additional restore points
will continue to be added though.

You *can* reduce the amount of space used by SR in "System Properties" and
go to the "System Restore" tab. The default setting I believe is 12% of
your disk space, which today can be a tremendous amount of space on the HD.
That default was conceived when HD's were considerably smaller. Many users
opt to moving the slider so that maybe only 1000 MB are used for SR.

Yep. I have a 200 gig HD, and have System Restore set to 1%. With
that, I can store multiple SysRestore files per day for more than 10
days - reasonably, no one should need more than that.

Tony

 

[Guest]

Thanks guys. That indeed was where the space had been eaten.

Rick

 

[Curt Christianson]

You're welcome Rick. Glad things worked out!

--
HTH,
Curt

Windows Support Center
www.aumha.org
Practically Nerded,...
http://dundats.mvps.org/Index.htm

| Thanks guys. That indeed was where the space had been eaten.
|
| Rick
|
| > Curt Christianson wrote:
| > > You *can* reduce the amount of space used by SR in "System Properties"
and
| > > go to the "System Restore" tab. >
| >
| > Yep. I have a 200 gig HD, and have System Restore set to 1%.