Windows Compression lossless or not???

[Mike Williams]

Only an idiot would ask a question like that. I know you are the champion of morons but some of us require people to use their brains. Thinking about it the answer is obvious, except to you of course. How many menu commands have you seen with the text "CORRUPT MY DATA".

Average users don't make that connection. They see "lossy" and
"lossless" compression thrown about without sufficient background to
make a connection. They are surprised when they transcode/compress their
images or music files and get lower quality, and can't get the original
level of detail back. A large percentage of users simply doesn't and
maybe never will get the difference between hardware & software,
programs & o/s & data and everything else is orders of magnitude too
subtle.

Even though Windows Help has pages and pages on file compression, it
doesn't say anything explicit about lossiness, even though in some
contexts it will offer to (lossily) compress your pictures for emailing.

 

[poochbeast]

Disk Cleanup keeps "recommending" that I can save space by compressing
my old files. A significant portion of my files are audio and video
files that I have not yet had the chance to burn to disc. What method
of compression does Windows use? Is it lossless? If not, I suspect
that it could severely damage my files. What kind of recommendation is
that?! I certainly wouldn't trust it to compress my files. Please
advise. Thank you.

 

[David Candy]

Only an idiot would ask such a question.

 

[Yves Leclerc]

Disk Cleanup keeps "recommending" that I can save space by compressing
my old files. A significant portion of my files are audio and video
files that I have not yet had the chance to burn to disc. What method
of compression does Windows use? Is it lossless? If not, I suspect
that it could severely damage my files. What kind of recommendation is
that?! I certainly wouldn't trust it to compress my files. Please
advise. Thank you.

You are confusing file compression with audio compression. Lossless
compression is a type of audio compression which will not "loose" any of the
audio "bytes". Windows Media Audio file format is one "lossless" audio
compression format.

 

[poochbeast]

Only an idiot would ask such a question.

Only an idiot would reply with such an answer. Hey David, go ****
yourself!. I doubt you even understand the question.

 

[PopS]

Only an idiot could make a comment like that:

"David Candy" <.> wrote in message
Only an idiot would ask such a question.

 

[Uwe Sieber]

I think 'Disk Cleanup' aims to Windows file compression
which is lossless of course. But audio and video files
usually doesn't contain compressible data, so it's wasted
time to comress them.

Greetings from Germany

Uwe

 

[David Candy]

Only an idiot would ask a question like that. I know you are the champion of morons but some of us require people to use their brains. Thinking about it the answer is obvious, except to you of course. How many menu commands have you seen with the text "CORRUPT MY DATA".

 

[poochbeast]

I notice that you wrote "I think" rather than "I know." I still have
found nothing definitive that states whether Windows File Compression
is lossless, rather than lossy. I have a 300 GB HD that is currently
maxed out (full). The ONLY files on the drive are audio and video
files. Yet Window says that it can free up 100 GB of disk space if I
compress my files. If, as you say, audio and video data contains no
compressible data, how is this possible? Most of the other posts that
I've read in this group advise against file compression. I could
really use the disk space, but certainly not at the risk of corrupting
my data.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

I notice that you wrote "I think" rather than "I know." I still have
found nothing definitive that states whether Windows File Compression
is lossless, rather than lossy.

Since it can compress all types of files, it has to be lossless. Lossy
compression makes no sense for text, exe files, etc.

I have a 300 GB HD that is currently
maxed out (full). The ONLY files on the drive are audio and video
files. Yet Window says that it can free up 100 GB of disk space if I
compress my files. If, as you say, audio and video data contains no
compressible data, how is this possible?

I don't use compression, so I can't be sure, but I have a guess. The 100GB
of disk space it says it can free up is just an estimate, based on the
*size* of the files, not their content.

Most of the other posts that
I've read in this group advise against file compression. I could
really use the disk space, but certainly not at the risk of corrupting
my data.

If it were me, I would spring for a bigger hard drive, rather than use
compression.

 

[poochbeast]

Thanks Ken -- That's EXACTLY the type of explanation I was looking
for. Your help is much appreciated.

poochbeast

 

[Mike Williams]

I notice that you wrote "I think" rather than "I know." I still have
found nothing definitive that states whether Windows File Compression
is lossless, rather than lossy. I have a 300 GB HD that is currently
maxed out (full). The ONLY files on the drive are audio and video
files. Yet Window says that it can free up 100 GB of disk space if I
compress my files.

You sure it didn't say 100MB?

I have a maxed 300GB drive too of similar files. Believe me, if it could
recover 100GB I would have done it long ago.

 

[Bob I]

How To Use File Compression in Windows XP
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/307987/en-us

 

[Uwe Sieber]

I notice that you wrote "I think" rather than "I know."

I think 'Disk Cleanup' aims to Windows file compression.
I know that Windows file compression is lossless.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

Thanks Ken -- That's EXACTLY the type of explanation I was looking
for. Your help is much appreciated.

You're welcome, but be careful not to rely too strongly on what I said. As I
said, I have no direct experinece with this, and I could be wrong.