My HomePrem computer takes up 19GB. How to slim down?

[beautiful]

Hello,
Our new laptop came with Win7 Home Premium.

I've just deleted the all restore points (Control Panel/System&Security/System/Advanced_System_settings/System_Protection_tab) and our new comp's hard drive is down to using just 19.2 GB (from 29.5 GB). According to other users (http://www.sevenforums.com/general-...pace-does-win7-homeprem-use-new-computer.html), a Win 7 Pro used up 6GB; a Win7 Ultimate took 10-12GB.

I'm using Win 7 Home Premium, but it's using up more GB than the Win7 Pro or Ultimate computers.

What's going on? The only thing we added was a measly virus scanner. How come we're up to 19 GB (remember, we've already deleted all restore points)?

What can I do to slim it down?

 

[richc46]

Probably the shadow copies.

Computer on desktop

Click

C drive

right click

Properties

disc clean up

System files.

If not done already you will get a lot of new space.

 

[unifex]

Did your laptop come with any software pre-installed? Such as trial of something or demo games or any such thing? For example on my C:\ drive I have about 45 GB of used space - that's Windows plus installed software, no user files.

On the other hand, you got a brand new laptop with only 30 GB hard drive? Or you've got several partitions there?

 

[beautiful]

I've uninstalled the pre-installed "WildTangent Games" and now used space dropped from 19.3 GB to 18.2. But I wonder if there are some more GB of space I can free up.

 

[beautiful]

On the other hand, you got a brand new laptop with only 30 GB hard drive? Or you've got several partitions there?

The new laptop came with 288 GB Capacity hard drive. There is only one main partition (or is it proper to say "there are no partitions"?).

 

[richc46]

Probably the shadow copies.

Computer on desktop

Click

C drive

right click

Properties

disc clean up

System files.

If not done already you will get a lot of new space.

did you try this

 

[beautiful]

rich, yes, it removed only a few hundred megabytes.

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

Hello.


Here is an excellent tutorial to use to optimize Windows 7, at the link below; also one to use to trim the amount of disk space system restore reserves for its self.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/11728-optimize-windows-7-a.html?ltr=O

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/335-system-protection-change-disk-space-usage.html

 

[unifex]

I must have misunderstood your previous post, where you mentioned 29.5 GB.

May I ask why are worrying about few GB on a 288 GB hard drive? Are you planning to fill it all up with videos or something?

Where are all these files are? When you say you've got 19 GB used, is that the whole hard drive usage, or just C:\, or just Windows? You said there is only one single partition, is there also a Recovery disk (or partition)? If yes, are you counting it in your used space?

 

[beautiful]

unifex,

the reason why i wanna slim down is because we are planning on creating a system image on DVDs. We don't want the DVDs to have junk, we want to use the least number of DVDs.

when I say we've got 19GB used, I mean the complete C drive (with subfolders). There is no recovery disk/partition.

 

[unifex]

What is the size of your C:\Windows folder? That would be OS. For my Ultimate I've got 9.5 GB there. What software is installed on your PC? What is the size of the Program Files? And finally what is the size of the C:\Users folder - very often there is lots of junk there, although this should not be the case on a brand new PC.

 

[richc46]

If you plan on using the built in system image and DVD, at least 50% chance it will not work. Use this instead.

When I tried system image on DVD, as also a few posters, I was forced to shut down by pulling the plug. Not good.

Free Backup Software: Paragon Backup & Recovery Free Edition - Overview

 

[beautiful]

What is the size of your C:\Windows folder? That would be OS. For my Ultimate I've got 9.5 GB there. What software is installed on your PC? What is the size of the Program Files? And finally what is the size of the C:\Users folder - very often there is lots of junk there, although this should not be the case on a brand new PC.

C:\Windows\
Size: 9.63 GB
Size on Disk: 9.72 GB


C:\Program Files\
Size: 4.29 GB
Size on Disk: 4.31 GB

C:\Users\
Size: 504 MB
Size on Disk: 512

P.S. Currently, i have 14.5 GB in all of the C: Drive.

 

[unifex]

Well, your C:\Windows size is similar to mine. What you can try is to see whether there are any Windows components you do not need - such as some games for example, or whatever else you are not using.

Also, see if all the installed programs are necessary for you, or at least for the your current purposes.

Finally, half a GB in C:\Users is a bit too much for a new PC, you can certainly cut down there.

I would also take a look at what Rich has suggested.

 

[Wishmaster]

Delete the Temp Files.


Hiberfile & Pagefile are the 2 that eat up the most space.

PF with be 1.5x whatever amount of RAM you have.


Others may disagree but what I do:
I decrease the size of my PF. I have 8GB of RAM, so that much is just not needed IMO. I finally settled at 2GB for my PF.

You can possibly reduce a little, or move it to another drive, but disabling it would be a bad idea.

Also, the Hyberfile you can delete, if you do NOT use Hibernate.

 

[Zomby88]

On the other hand, you got a brand new laptop with only 30 GB hard drive? Or you've got several partitions there?

The new laptop came with 288 GB Capacity hard drive. There is only one main partition (or is it proper to say "there are no partitions"?).

It is proper to say you have 1 partition.

 

[whs]

There are a couple of things you can do:

1. Eliminate the hibernation file with powercfg.exe -h off in elevated cmd. That will save you several GBs.
2. Create a seperate data partition and move all user files.
3. Reduce the page file to 200MB (which is minimum). But I would do that only for the imaging. Later you should set it back to default.

My Win7 is about 17GB (with #1 and #2 implemented), but I have a ton of programs installed. My winsxs is over 4GBs alone. If you abandon the restore points, you should do frequent imaging. Else you have no safety net at all.

 

[n0th1n9]

If you want to have an image backup then might I suggest using an external USB HDD. The performance is far better than that of any optical drive.

 

[KazeNoKoe23]

I've seen default installations of Windows 7 x64 (regardless of version) take up 15+ GB of HD space, so it's entirely possible that it's just the OS. As "streamlined" as Windows 7 is compared to Vista, it doesn't take up any less space on the hard drive.

 

[Bare Foot Kid]

I don't see a very big difference in the space used by Windows 7 as opposed to what's used by Vista, considering this install of W 7 is only about 8 hours old and I have almost nothing installed on W 7 yet.