Yes, you probably have processes running in the background writing
to the disk.
One example, Event Viewer logs:
C:\WINDOWS\system32\config\AppEvent.Evt
C:\WINDOWS\System32\config\SecEvent.Evt
C:\WINDOWS\system32\config\SysEvent.Evt
Services.exe/Event Log service.
Not that these logs should grow that big. Although they can grow
big and cause problems.
See: How to Set Log Size and Overwrite Options here >>>
HOW TO: View and Manage Event Logs in Event Viewer in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;308427
Another background process...
wmiprvse.exe or wmiadap.exe, I don't know which, creates the files
located in >>> C:\WINDOWS\PCHealth\HelpCtr\DataColl
There are probably more running in the background, I just thought of
those two off the top of my head.
---
You aren't running NtBackup, are you?
---
Make sure your Temporary Internet files are totally empty. If not
cleaned out, Content.IE5 can get huge. Disk Cleanup does *not*
clean out the contents of the Content.IE5 folder. Sad, but true.
IMHO, Disk Cleanup is worthless.
To delete *all* Temporary Internet Files...
1) Start | Run | Type: inetcpl.cpl | OK
Or right click the Internet Explorer icon on your Desktop.
Or: Start | Settings | Control Panel | Internet Options.
Best to do this with all instances of Internet Explorer closed.
Especially
if there are a large number of files.
2) On the General Tab, in the middle of the screen, click on Delete
Files 3) Check the box Delete all offline content {This cleans >>
C:\Documents
and Settings\YourNameHere\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files AND
C:\Documents and Settings\YourNameHere\Local Settings\Temporary
Internet Files\Content.IE5 and \Content.MSO
4) Click on OK and wait for the hourglass icon to stop after it
deletes the
temporary internet files
5) You can now click on Delete Cookies and click OK to delete
cookies that websites have placed on your hard drive.
Temporary Internet Files Use More Disk Space Than Specified
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;301057
---
Compacting OE folders should *not* duplicate the folders and/or their
contents to another location on the disk. Find out for sure, do a
Search for *.dbx.
All OE *.dbx files should be located here >>>
C:\Documents and Settings\Your Name Here\Local Settings\Application
Data\Identities\{Your GUID #}\Microsoft\Outlook Express
Also if you have AutoCAD, there'll be a couple of *.dbx files from
that.
Unless you have 'em backed up some where else. I.e. C:\OE Backup
Folder
You stated that you have System Restore turned off, this can cause
C:\System Volume Information to become fairly large, so that's not
the problem.
---
[[The NTFS file system supports many volume- and file-level features
that may cause free disk space to be either misreported or reported
as lost. You
may notice this behavior if an NTFS volume suddenly becomes very
full, and you cannot find the cause or locate the folders and files
that cause the NTFS volume to become full. This behavior may occur
if a user gains malicious or unauthorized access to an NTFS volume
on which either very large files or a high quantity of small files
are secretly copied, and then
removes or restricts NTFS permissions on these files. This behavior
may also
occur after a system malfunction or a power outage that causes volume
corruption to occur.]]
From >>>
How to Locate and Correct Disk Space Problems on NTFS Volumes in
Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;315688
--
Hope this helps. Let us know.
Wes
In
alegator said:
Yes, of course, I rebooted, refreshed and disk usage increased. I
also performed a disk cleanup.Also, I don't have any process
running in the background writing to disk. System restore is turned
off. This drives me crazy. On the other hand I checked the size of
OE folders and they decreased, so compacting must be writing files
to another area of the disk.
:
Did you refresh? Reboot?
Compact Your OE Folders
http://www.insideoe.com/files/maintain.htm#compact
--
Hope this helps. Let us know.
Wes
In alegator <
[email protected]> hunted and pecked:
I have WinXP Pro SP2. By design SP2 is programmed to prompt if the
user wants to Compact Outlook Express folders. Form what I know
what compacting does is physically delete the email messages that
were flagged in the OE database as deleted, therefore this
process should increase disk free space. After each time that I
compact OE folders instead I observe that disk usage increases
(free space decreases). Eventually, after a certain number of
compacting processes there won't be any space left in my hard
disk!. What is going on? How can I fix this? Thanks.
