No disk clean-up button?

[nate42nd]

I just noticed my boot drive has no "disk clean-up" button. It's an SSD. Is this something Windows 7 is doing because the drive is an SSD? Is it saying "you don't want to do needless erasing of harmless files"? What is going on here?

Here it is next to my D drive for reference. I do have system restore off but it should still be there for icons and temp files. Is this the case with everybody who has system restore off or does it have to do with the disk itself?

 

[Brink]

Hi Nate,

Strange, I have the Disk Cleanup button for my SSD drive. Running Disk Cleanup on a SSD drive is fine, but you do not want to run a disk defragmenter on one since it will shorten the SSD's lifespan.

What SSD drive do you have, and how do you have it connected? We can see if others with the same setup are experiencing the same thing.

 

[nate42nd]

Hey Brink, I have a Patriot Torqx 128GB SSD. It's connected to the motherboard, my board has two controllers. The normal one and 2 SATA ports controlled by a Gigabyte chip. I have it hooked to the normal ones in AHCI mode. I can also bring it up by typing "disk cleanup" in the search box and it gives me the option of all my disks. I can do it this way but it's odd that it's gone.

 

[Brink]

Nate,

I have my drives only connected to the yellow SATA ports (Intel) on my Gigabyte motherboard.

Have you already update the firmware and installed the Trim utility software for the SSD?

Patriot Memory - Support

 

[logicearth]

It is probably that way because Disk Cleanup can shorten the life of an SSD if it is done multiple times. So taking the Disk Clean out from the main Properties page would help it from being used all the time. Any time there is writing to the SSD, it will shorten its lifespan. And it is not so simple to delete a file on an SSD then it is on a traditional HDD. Entire blocks must be read and rewritten.

 

[nate42nd]

Nate,

I have my drives only connected to the yellow SATA ports (Intel) on my Gigabyte motherboard.

Have you already update the firmware and installed the Trim utility software for the SSD?

Patriot Memory - Support

Yes I have mine connected to the #0 port on one of the 6 yellow Intel ports. I have the updated firmware and the "Performance restore" utility. I don't know if it's TRIM. I have done both. It's up to date. It's running great too!

It is probably that way because Disk Cleanup can shorten the life of an SSD if it is done multiple times. So taking the Disk Clean out from the main Properties page would help it from being used all the time.

Any time there is writing to the SSD, it will shorten its lifespan.

This was what I assumed at first, but I have never heard of this and if Brink has a comparable SSD and his is there....it doesn't make any sense. Also, I cannot find anything on the web about this. There are a couple of us out there but nothing has been resolved that I can see.

 

[logicearth]

You can read more about the limitation of flash memory on wikipedia.
Flash memory - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

One limitation of flash memory is that although it can be read or programmed a byte or a word at a time in a random access fashion, it must be erased a "block" at a time. This generally sets all bits in the block to 1. Starting with a freshly erased block, any location within that block can be programmed. However, once a bit has been set to 0, only by erasing the entire block can it be changed back to 1. In other words, flash memory (specifically NOR flash) offers random-access read and programming operations, but cannot offer arbitrary random-access rewrite or erase operations.

So what happens is this: read-erase-write. Both erase, and write take a slice from the the life of an SSD.

 

[nate42nd]

So what happens is this: read-erase-write. Both erase, and write take a slice from the the life of an SSD.

I understand the downside of an SSD. The upside is FAR greater. That's why pretty much everybody wants one. I would never go back to normal hard disks now. It's the best upgrade you can do for almost any system.

You could be right. That was my first guess. The question is: Why is my button not there and Brinks button is there.

BTW-If you really want to get to know SSDs read this.
AnandTech: The SSD Anthology: Understanding SSDs and New Drives from OCZ

And here is a list of great (Intel,Samsung) good (indilinx) and one step down (JMicron, dual JMicron) controllers and which drives they are.

 

[Brink]

Nate,

I'm not sure why I have the button and you do not when we both have a SSD. I would say that it may be since yours is a newer model than my older Patriot SSD, then Windows 7 may detect and work with it better to automatically set all of the optimizations for a SSD.

 

[nate42nd]

Well thanks for looking into it. I have noticed more things today out of the ordinary. I decided to install the RTM version. I just finished up. I installed it on a normal 640GB disk just to test it out. I will get this version on the SSD in the next week or so and see if everything is the same as before. You may be right. My SSD has a different controller from yours. They are different models.

 

[n0th1n9]

Hello Nate42nd.

In your recycle bin properties check to see if the associated drive has been checked to delete immediately rather than move files to recycle bin. This will cause the disk cleanup option to be removed.

 

[Brink]

LOL, beat me to it n0th1n9. Welcome to Seven Forums.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/22180-disk-cleanup-add-remove-drive-properties.html

 

[nate42nd]

AHHHHHHHHH crap. I should have thought of that. Thanks so much. I will remember that one. You are right. I just though it would still be there for the other stuff.

Thanks again.

This forum rules. Other forums on the net never figured this out.

Pretty good for your 1st post. Welcome to the forum.