Howdy, Stranger!
It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
Quick Links
Defragmenting
What is up with my PC?
Anything look wierd to you guys? this is after defragmenting several times.. I don't understand how I'm using almost 25 gb's... I have guildwars and warcraft installed that's it. Also some music and a few programs like a virus scanner etc.. I'm runnin xp home. It just feels like some huge files are hidden on me somewhere but I'm not sure what to look for. Should I bother searchin through this mess or just reinstall windows?
I just want my comp to be organized and efficient.
Comments
Do a disk cleanup, temporary and pre-installation files can take up quite abit if you dont clear them freaquently.
---
Also go to the management console and look at your error logs under system files just to make sure you don't have any unreadable blocks (sign of a bad harddrive) or anything like that.
Also you can try a 3rd party defragmenter, just look on filehippo.com everything there is free pretty much.
download auslogig diskdefrag off of download.com. it's free and does a great job
member of imminst.org
What they said. XP defragmenting doesn't work all that well anyway, though it's miles ahead of what windows 98 was.
Defragmenting doesn't delete anything, it just finds random bits of files spread across your computer and lumps them together again.
Do the disk cleanup. Something like the products others have already suggested will help clean up temp files, cookies, fragmented file extensions no longer in use, setup files etc that can take up space.
D.
That is a great idea but you could also (if you haven't already) look at the defragmentation report after it is done. At the bottom of the report it will tell you if there are any files it could not defragment. The larger the file, the more red that remains.
-Falacu
1-19-2007
there is an excellent program called O&O defrag, http://www.oo-software.com/en/ with which you can start a boot time defrag, which has complete access to all of your files, as while windows is running a lot of system files and any files that are in use are locked and are unable to be defragged, also if u dont want to use a 3rd party app, you can try running ur PC in safe mode and defragging from there, as you will get a lot less files locked, which in turn will cut down the amount of red, typically though any disk that is defragged will still have some fragmentation in the file system, hopefully this will sort your problem
Here are a few suggestions to help get control over your disk usage (separate from following some of the recommendations already mentioned):
1.) Limit System Restore. Honestly, the default setting really makes this thing consume more than enough hard drive space for restore points. Anyways, it is a good practice to not go nuts on restore points; keep them only before actions which could cause you undue stress (major driver updates, service pack installs, etc). Limit this thing WAY down. Depending on your size hard drive, it isn't unusual to only need it hovering between 1%-3%. Make sure System Restore is only active on one drive also - If you have multiple drives on your pc, choose one and only one to use for restore points and turn off system restore on the other drives.
2.) Take a look at your swap/paging file size. Windows loves to set your min/max to two different values with gigs in between (usually). Look at the bottom of the screen and see what the recommended size is, set the min/max to match this size - This actually helps performance on your drive as well because you will not have windows "thrashing" the hard drive with writes in a space that expands/decreases within that range.
3.) Delete ALL of your online/offline web browser cache from any and all web browsers on your system.
4.) Pretty much delete anything within your temp folder. Don't only look at C: emp but also look at the Windows emp folder - Lots of applications love to leave behind their entire install programs here.
5.) Go to your Windows directory. See all of those "$NtUninstall..." folders (Make sure you folder settings allow you to see hidden files/folders and system folders)? Those are from all of your Microsoft patches, including service packs. These things take up A LOT of room. If you don't intend on uninstalling any of the patches (and you most likely won't - unless they caused a major problem for your system): Delete them! Shift key + delete will blow them right up without stopping at the recycle bin.
6.) Empty your recycle bin.
7.) Search for "*.dmp" files on your drive. These are dump files from system crashes, or unscheduled reboots that, depending on your system setting, can tie up a lot of drive space.
8.) Patch logs. You will find these also in your Windows folder. They begin with "KB#####.log". These are safe to delete.
9.) Look for zip files that you have unpacked or torrents/install files that you have already combined. Keep either the initial files or the final files for the install/movie/program - There is no need to keep both the initial files you downloaded AND the final product. Another good way to look at this is with drivers. Driver programs love to self-extract themselves into C:<folder name> and launch their install program from there. This is all well and good, however, they leave the folder behind. Typically they are obvious folder names, "Nvidia", "ATI", "Drivers", etc. Just be sure you don't need anything in there before you begin to blow them up.
*Edit*
Make sure you go into your WoW folder and delete all of those damned patch downloaders and patch files - You really just don't need to keep these on your system. They take up A LOT of room, all combined.
10.) Download CCleaner and make sure you go through the settings for all the applications (like cookies, etc) and keep what you want to keep. Once you run it, it will wipe (up to DoD standard) anything you tell it to. It does a good job at clearing the crap off your pc.
11.) Schedule a scandisk to run on your system after you've done all of this.
12.) Turn your screensaver OFF and run Defrag. Once Defrag is done, enable your screensaver, reboot, and see how you did.
Goodluck!
Try a defrag in safe mode.
----ITS A TRAP!!!----
thx for all the great advice everyone!
so now we're lookin like this
Now that looks ALOT better. I wonder what those green files are.. and that huge blue one at the end... just sitting there... mocking me. big blue is trying to escape my computer isn't he! guy's almost out lol
Just remember one thing:
The windows internal defragger can not defragment files.
Yes, you read that right. It can not. If you take a totally defragmented drive with accumulated free space, it will look like getting shot by a shotgun after you use the internal defragger on it.
Same for a normal defragmentation of a heavily fragmented drive: It will shift some files and take some days, but will not achieve anything but heavy cpu usage.
Use O&O, it is the best one at the moment (but a bit costly). There were some tests of popular defraggers, and o&o had the best results.. (mainly one of the german magazine c't from heise.)