Member Avatar for tez

On XP I have two hard drives - C (original drive) is 20GB with 10.7GB free. The second drive I had fitted has only 295 MB (Yes MB!) on 10GB (actually 8.56GB).
In spite of deleting unwanted photos and music I cannot seem to gain much additional space on D driver and sooner or later I will run into mega-problems with Windows!
Is it true that the file segments are still considered 'occupied' even though the contents may have been deleted?
Any (simple) suggestions as to how to regain space on D would be appreciated. Anything I have installed recently I have installed to the larger drive and I don't have any large games installed either.
Thanks.

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— the immediate priority is to find what is actually using space on D: rather than keep deleting random files. Normally deleting a file marks its blocks free, but space can remain tied up if a process still has the file open, if system files or backups are storing data out of sight, or if a folder on D points to another volume.

Make a quick inventory first: run a disk-usage visualizer to see the largest folders and files at a glance, and enable viewing of hidden and protected system files so nothing important is being missed. Look specifically for large single files (disk images, old installers), backup or sync archives, and system-maintained items such as the paging file or the hibernation file. Also check whether a backup/antivirus program is keeping quarantined or archived files on D, or whether a mount/junction is redirecting space elsewhere.

Safe recovery steps: move or reconfigure any large system files off D if they belong elsewhere (paging/hibernate), export big media/archives to external media before deleting, clear any program quarantines, and remove old backup archives. If deleted space does not reappear immediately, reboot to release any open file handles. Do not manually delete unknown system folders (for example, System Volume Information) without a backup and understanding of the consequences.

Some excellent cleaning and maintenance suggestions are already in replies from , and ; those can help once the real space hogs have been identified. Aim to keep a reasonable buffer of free space on each partition (single-digit MB free is risky) so Windows and applications have room to work.

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Member Avatar for tayspen

Try CCleaner it removes unneeded files, and if configured correctly cn free up lots of space.

Member Avatar for Lord Soth

Hi,

Try going to "Documents and Settings\<your user name>\Local Settings\Temp" folder where XP is installed and delete everything from there. What you ask isn't true. If you use NTFS file system you can right click on folders and go to properties, hit "Advanced" Button and check "Compress contents to save disk space" and then after hiting OK it will ask if you want to apply it to sub folders too, just click "OK" and it will compress them for a while; the access time will be degraded because of the on the fly decompression while using but this system is transparent to user. On Folders you don't use a lot you can just right click and select Send To-Comprssed (zipped) folder to ZIP them (this isn't the same thing as before) and delete the original folder to keep the ZIPed one (even beter download WinRAR and RAR anything you don't use.) If you have a CD Writer, buy some CD-RWs and download the free InCD program from Nero, which let you use the CD-RWs just like hard disk or flah drive with no further recording software necessary.

Loren Soth

Member Avatar for tayspen

Documents and Settings\<your user name>\Local Settings\Temp

CCleaner tacare of that, along with

Internet Explorer
Temporary files, URL history, cookies, Autocomplete form history, index.dat.

Firefox
Temporary files, URL history, cookies, download history.

Windows
Recycle Bin, Recent Documents, Temporary files and Log files.

Registry cleaner
Advanced features to remove unused and old entries, including File Extensions, ActiveX Controls, ClassIDs, ProgIDs, Uninstallers, Shared DLLs, Fonts, Help Files, Application Paths, Icons, Invalid Shortcuts and more... also comes with a comprehensive backup feature.

Third-party applications
Removes temp files and recent file lists (MRUs) from many apps including Opera, Media Player, eMule, Kazaa, Google Toolbar, Netscape, MS Office, Nero, Adobe Acrobat, WinRAR, WinAce, WinZip and many more...

Member Avatar for jingalala

On XP I have two hard drives - C (original drive) is 20GB with 10.7GB free. The second drive I had fitted has only 295 MB (Yes MB!) on 10GB (actually 8.56GB).
In spite of deleting unwanted photos and music I cannot seem to gain much additional space on D driver and sooner or later I will run into mega-problems with Windows!
Is it true that the file segments are still considered 'occupied' even though the contents may have been deleted?
Any (simple) suggestions as to how to regain space on D would be appreciated. Anything I have installed recently I have installed to the larger drive and I don't have any large games installed either.
Thanks.

If you have deleted stuff, run chkdsk and then the disk defragmenter on the drive. you can Analyze the fragmentation levels first. run a disk cleanup and defrag regularly when there is enough free space on the drive for smooth performance.

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