system restore

G

Guest

I have 2 500GB HD's on a PC I purchased just over 2 weeks ago. I found that
everday something uses up between 2-4GB of disk space, so much so that even
though i only had about 28GB of stuff on pc there was 82GB of Used Space. Is
this System Restore that's taking up all this space. I disabled SR and lost
all by restore points, but i miraculously regained 55GB of Free Space. Anyone
else had this experience. Is this nomal?
Thanks
 
B

Bert Kinney

Hi,

Re-enable System Restore on the partitions Windows is installed on, and set
it to use 1 to 2 GB's (1000 to 2000 MB's) of disk space.

How to Adjust the amount of disk space System Restore uses to hold restore
points:
http://bertk.mvps.org/html/diskspace.html

Do not let System Restore monitor the second drive. It will be monitored by
default when System Restore is enabled.

How to disable a monitored drive:
http://bertk.mvps.org/html/drivedisable.html

If Zone Alarm is installed, read this.

ZA Free bloats System Restore - Beware - General - ZoneAlarm User Forum
http://forum.zonelabs.org/zonelabs/board/message?board.id=gen&message.id=34871

Regards,
Bert Kinney MS-MVP Shell/User
http://bertk.mvps.org
Member: http://dts-l.org
 
G

Guest

There are some files skipped when making backups, but most of them are are.

Right click any folder and click "Restore previous versions". Choose a date
and click Open. These are all files from the backups system restore creates.
 
C

Cal Bear '66

You are confusing Shadow Copies (not available on all versions of Vista) and
System Restore. Doing a System Restore will NOT restore data files to previous
versions.
 
B

Bert Kinney

Hi,

System restore in Vista utilizes the Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) which
manages restore points or shadow copies. A shadow copy is essentially a
previous version of a file or folder at a specific point. Restore points are
a special type of shadow copy because they store specific information needed
during a system repair with System Restore. Shadow Copies are also created
by Previous Versions, Windows Backup, and CompletePC Backup. CompletePC
Backup is only available in Windows Vista Business, Ultimate, and Enterprise
editions.

The shadow copy storage area is where all types shadow copies are stored on
each volume where VSC (Volume Shadow Copy) is turned on.

When you disable System Restore the shadow copy storage area is emptied. The
one exception my be the original CompletePC Backup.

To save disk space the shadow copy storage areas can be resized.

Before doing this, re-enable System Restore on the partition where Windows
Vista is installed and determine the amount of disk space being used to hold
shadow copies.

From within an administrator account open the command prompt. To do so go
to Start – All Programs – Accessories and click on the Command Prompt. It
may be necessary to right click on Command Prompt and select Run as
administrator.

To displays all shadow copy storage associations on the system and their
size, type or paste the following command into the command prompt window and
press enter.

vssadmin list shadowstorage

Post the results here.


Regards,
Bert Kinney MS-MVP Shell/User
http://bertk.mvps.org
Member: http://dts-l.org
 
B

Bert Kinney

Hi,

Restore points and Previous Versions are two different types of Shadow
Copies. A shadow copy is essentially a previous version of a file or folder
at a specific point. Restore points are a special type of shadow copy
because they store specific information needed during a system repair with
System Restore. Shadow Copies are created by Previous Versions, Windows
Backup, and CompletePC Backup.

Monitored file types in Windows Vista:
http://bertk.mvps.org/html/monitoredfilesv.html

Regards,
Bert Kinney MS-MVP Shell/User
http://bertk.mvps.org
Member: http://dts-l.org
 
G

Guest

thanks Brink

but is it normal for SR to use up between 2-4GB of disk space for one
restore point?

tx


WS
 
G

Guest

Hi Bert

My disk space has suddnely reduced by 2.4GB without a SR checkpoint taking
place the last checkpoint was 7 hours ago.
what could be the cause of that do u think?

tx

WS
 
B

Bert Kinney

No usually. But again, restore points are not the only shadow copies being
created. Previous versions are also being created.

Use the instruction previously posted to show how much space is being used
by running the vssadmin list shadowstorage command, and post the results here.


Regards,
Bert Kinney MS-MVP Shell/User
http://bertk.mvps.org
Member: http://dts-l.org
 
G

Guest

Here it is Bert:

Used Shadow Copy Storage: 2.501 GB
Allocated Shadow Copy Storage: 5.102 GB
Maximum Shadow Copy Storage space: 69.673 GB

Tx

WS
 
G

Guest

Hi Bert

In my Disk CleanUp I have a 'Hibernation File Cleaner' taking up 2.99GB.
Any idea what this is?

Tx

WS
 
B

Bert Kinney

Yes, that is a dedicated space on the hard drive reserved for holding the
system in memory when the Hibernation option is chosen, instead of shutdown
or restart.

If you do not use the Hibernation feature it can be disabled to save disk space.

How to disable and re-enable hibernation on a computer that is running
Windows Vista
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/920730/en-us

It is encouraging to see you asking these questions before acting on them.
Often folks come here looking for help after they have deleted thing they
shouldn't have. :)


Regards,
Bert Kinney MS-MVP Shell/User
http://bertk.mvps.org
Member: http://dts-l.org
 
G

Guest

thnx Brink!!

brink said:
WS,

Do not check that option for cleaning in Disk Cleanup. If you do, it
will disable the sleep mode. That is the storage area on your hard
drive that Vista uses to dump the contents of your RAM when it goes into
sleep mode.

Shawn


--
brink

*There are no dumb questions, just the people that do not ask them.*
_http://www.Vistax64.com (\"http://www.Vistax64.com\")_
*Please post feedback to help others.*
Click to expand...
 
G

Guest

Bert

It's a 500GB HD (464GB formatted) so its 15% of the 464GB.

I would like to reduce it to just 30GB.

What about this Hibernation File Cleaner thing?

Tx

WS
 
B

Bert Kinney

Hi Tx,

At an elevated command prompt, type or paste the following command and press
enter. There's a good chance all shadow copies will be deleted in the process.

vssadmin resize shadowstorage /For=C: /On=C: /MaxSize=30GB

Run the vssadmin list shadowstorage command again and post the results here.

For more information on how to adjust disk space in Windows Vista:
http://bertk.mvps.org/html/diskspacev.html

Regards,
Bert Kinney MS-MVP Shell/User
http://bertk.mvps.org
Member: http://dts-l.org
 

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