Windows7 XP mode - lost space after deleting XP Mode

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  1. Posts : 2,737
    Windows 7 Enterprise (x64); Windows Server 2008 R2 (x64)
       #11

    profdlp said:
    Imre Burnyoczki said:
    Hi,

    Another info: one of my colleagues still uses XP Mode on his PC, and his Windows reduced free space size with 127GB also. Maybe it's normal, I don't know. It seems to me that I haven't got this space back after deleting XP Mode.

    Imre
    Google "127GB Limit". Unless it's a pretty big coincidence it sounds like the XP Mode setup created a virtual 32-Bit LBA partition which is not properly reverting back to the Win 7 standard 48-Bit LBA. As I recall, back in the early Win XP days it wasn't until SP1 that this was corrected.

    Not much help, assuming I'm on to something, but it might be a lead in the right direction.

    One other things is that Windows Explorer is notorious for not including everything in subfolders when you highlight a gob of stuff and the Right-Click>>Properties. It could be a simple computer "accounting error".
    Yes yes, great point. I remember someone else talking about a hidden partition in Windows 7. They deleted it and everything worked fine. I cannot remember where I read that...was it here....hummm
      My Computer


  2. Posts : 17,545
    Windows 10 Pro x64 EN-GB
       #12

    Imre Burnyoczki said:
    Hi,

    Another info: one of my colleagues still uses XP Mode on his PC, and his Windows reduced free space size with 127GB also. Maybe it's normal, I don't know. It seems to me that I haven't got this space back after deleting XP Mode.

    Imre
    By default XP Mode does not take 127 GB of hard disk space. It is only possible if the user has converted the default dynamic vhd to a 127 GB fixed size vhd.

    In Microsoft Virtual PC, the maximum size of a vhd is 127 GB. You can not mount or use virtual hard disks bigger than that. When you create a vhd in Virtual PC, it is by default a so called dynamic disk. This means it only uses as much space on host HD as needed but it is allowed to expand, grow, to that maximum you choose when creating the vhd. For instance, I have created a Windows Vista virtual machine, setting the dynamic size of the vhd to be 50 GB. Currently this vhd is 17.5 GB, taking as much space from my host HD; if I install new programs to this Vista vm, it is however allowed to expand until that 50 GB limit. Vista virtual machine sees this vhd as a 50 GB HD because a virtual machine always sees the HD as big as its allowed maximum size.

    XP Mode is a Virtual PC virtual machine. Its vhd is a 127 GB dynamic disk. This simply means that the virtual hard disk of XP Mode is allowed to expand up to 127 GB. This is why if you check the HD size when running XP Mode, it shows its HD is 126 GB (the XP Mode base vhd, which is needed for XP Mode to run reserves 1 GB from total 127 GB). A virtual machine sees the dynamic vhd always as big as its maximum size. However, on host's HD it only uses the space it needs. Here's a quite freshly installed XP Mode vhd, you can see it is only a bit over 6 GB seen from the host:

    Windows7 XP mode - lost space after deleting XP Mode-xpm_vhd_size.png

    And here's the same vhd, this time seen from the XP Mode showing 126 GB (maximum size minus base vhd):

    Windows7 XP mode - lost space after deleting XP Mode-xpm_vhd_size_2.png

    You can convert a dynamic vhd to a fixed size vhd. A fixed size vhd is always the same size, also taking exactly that space from host's hd:

    No code has to be inserted here.

    Kari
    Last edited by Kari; 14 Jan 2011 at 06:20. Reason: Several typos
      My Computer


  3. Posts : 5
    Windows 7 32bit
    Thread Starter
       #13

    Hi,

    Sorry, I try to cope with your kind answers... Unfortunately I haven't solved this problem yet (I tried to shrink, and expand the disk, run chkdsk on it, etc.). Maybe the key factor is the differencing type disk. I found a site (hungarian only), that explains the same symptoms: after start the operating system allocates the maximum dynamic size on disk, and everything is perfect if the disk has enough free space.

    I try to find and post some additional info about it.

    Imre
      My Computer


  4. Posts : 17,545
    Windows 10 Pro x64 EN-GB
       #14

    Imre, if you have uninstalled XP Mode and deleted its files, it is no longer taking any space on your HD.

    Differencing disks only means that by default, XP Mode uses two different vhd's: XP Mode Base.vhd in C:\Program Files\Windows XP Mode\, and Windows XP Mode.vhd in C:\Users\Your_Username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Virtual PC\Virtual Machines\ (read this and this).

    Differencing disks can be fixed size or dynamic. For instance in XP Mode's case, one of the two vhd's used (the base vhd) is fixed size and the other is dynamic. Using differencing disks have nothing to do with how much space the vhd takes from host HD. A fixed size vhd takes its actual size, a dynamic vhd only what it needs.

    A dynamic vhd only allocates as much HD space as it needs. If your Hungarian website tells XP Mode allocates 127 GB of HD space, it's simply not true.

    To make this even more confusing :
    Let's say you have 50 GB free on your HD. You can create a Virtual PC virtual machine, creating a dynamic vhd of 127 GB, more than the free space you have. You install Windows 7 to this virtual machine, which takes about 15 or 16 GB. If you now check your host, you'll notice that you still have about 35 GB of free space because the dynamic vhd only takes the space what it needs, in this case 15 GB. But when you run the Windows 7 virtual machine and check the HD size, it shows it has a 127 GB HD.

    So, you have created a dynamic 127 GB vhd on a HD which only had 50 GB free space. Your new Windows 7 virtual machine is allowed to expand its vhd up to 127 GB, but in this case it can expand only to about 50 GB because then there's no more space on your HD for the dynamic vhd to expand. If you want to really use the full 127 GB, you have to delete something else from the HD so that the vhd can expand to its maximum size.

    Kari
      My Computer


  5. Posts : 2,737
    Windows 7 Enterprise (x64); Windows Server 2008 R2 (x64)
       #15

    Imre Burnyoczki said:
    Hi,

    Sorry, I try to cope with your kind answers... Unfortunately I haven't solved this problem yet (I tried to shrink, and expand the disk, run chkdsk on it, etc.). Maybe the key factor is the differencing type disk. I found a site (hungarian only), that explains the same symptoms: after start the operating system allocates the maximum dynamic size on disk, and everything is perfect if the disk has enough free space.

    I try to find and post some additional info about it.

    Imre
    Is it possible that Windows 7 made some extra restore points for the removal of XP Mode? Maybe that is taking up the extra space???
      My Computer


 
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