Windows 10: my SSD is already running out of space

Hi all
So, I am now the proud owner of a new laptop. I have just spent the longest period of my life (a year) without a PC, since 1988 - absolute torture, I am lost without one. Tragic but true!

I was not too sure where to put this post, software or hardware, so apologies if it is the wrong place.

I have a laptop with 2 hard drives - an SSD 128GB and a 1TB physical HD. This concept is all new to me. So I wondered if anyone had any thoughts. I understand that obviously my operating software all needs to be on the SSD, and things like movies, photos, saved games etc all go on the 1TB. I wondered, should I install other software on the SSD, or the 1TB, because my SSD is already running out of space. Any comments on how people use their two drives would be most appreciated. I have to say though, first time I have had a flash drive, and I am impressed, it's so, so quick, especially with my i7 processor. I love my new machine!!

Also, my PC is set so it defaults to saving/installing onto the SSD, something I need to change. Could you point me in the right direction...??

Anyway, thanks in advance, and it's nice to be here!!

David *Smile

:)

 

Backup drive is running out of space

Hi,

In Windows 10, you can either use File History in Settings or Backup and Restore (Windows 7) in Control Panel to back up your files or the image of your Windows 10. Just to clarify, what tool did you use to back up your files or image? If you used Back and
Restore (Windows 7) and you set up a back up schedule, the drive that you're using for the back up will surely consume a large amount of space. To free up disk space, you can either delete an old back up or you can set up Backup and Restore (Windows 7) to
only save the latest backup file. To do this, follow these steps:

Delete an old backup file:

• Open Control Panel and access Backup and Restore (Windows 7).
• Click Manage space.
• Select View backups....
• Choose the backup the you want to delete, and then press Delete.

Keep the latest system image:

• Open Control Panel and access Backup and Restore (Windows 7).
• Click Manage space.
• Select Change settings....
• Choose Keep only the latest system image and minimize space used by backup, and then press
  OK.

If you do not want to use the current location of your backup anymore and you want to change it to your external drive, you can do so by following these steps:

• Open Backup and Restore (Windows 7) in Control Panel.
• Press Change settings.
  
  
• Choose the drive you want to save your backup file, and then click Next.
• Choose your backup settings.
• Press Save settings and run backup.

If you want to create a bootable media or an installation media of Windows 10, you can do so by using the Media Creation Tool. Please take note that you need a USB flash drive with at least 8 GB of space so that you can create a bootable media. You can download
the Media Creation Tool here. The link also has the steps on how to create and use the bootable media.

If you have additional questions, kindly reply to this thread.

 

Windows 10 size on HDD (32 GB SSD enough)

My Dell with 150Gb already run out of space.

Office 2016 (1gb only for Lync caching).

Visual Studio 2017

I attempt to install then on the regular hard drive but just few files went to HDD, all of then went to SSD.

 

Hi,
Might review this
Move Users Folder Location in Windows 10 Installation Upgrade Tutorials

 

Hi,
Hiberfil.sys
As you have a SSD, you don't need hibernation or fast boot, so you don't need hiberfil.sys.

To remove that:
Open a command prompt as administrator and run:

powercfg /h off

I guess you only have one partition on your SSD. Best practice is to keep all your personal data off C: so you can do OS maintenance without risking losing your data.

Nothing forces you to use Documents, Videos, Photos - the default libraries at all. So you can use folders on your other drive.

Programs (not universal apps)
Whilst most of these can be installed with the path specified as (say) D:\Programs\...... this isn't a great idea, as usually there are plenty of folders, files and registry entries created on C: other than the primary installation folder.

Exceptions would be particularly large programs, typically games. Programs you don't mind reinstalling if necessary. So you can be selective here.

Used Space
Use tools to check where your space is going such as Windirstat (free).

Clean up
Use Ccleaner (free/commercial), and run it periodically. Don't forget to check through its options.

Defaults

You may be able to change the 'save' default of some programs.
Don't try to change the default for program installation (exe's).

Universal Apps
There is a tutorial that allows you to change where universal apps are placed, but note the limitations carefully and consider whether you wish to do that.

(Note these use a different paradigm- no exe's, dll's, registry or parameters)

Disk Imaging
Please seriously consider this to secure your PC and your data. Disk images let you recover from many bad situations quickly and without technical help. E.g. Macrium Reflect (free). Don't leave it too late.

 

There are many ways to go about moving files without need of extravagant tweaks or software depending on wants and needs. The simplest way is just to move the files and folders you want to another more spacious drive is a simple cut/copy paste job.

However for programs / system files I would NOT advertise cut / paste as this can cause system problems. If you want to move an installed program like say Photoshop from say C to D drive, it's best to uninstall and reinstall to a new location. This is because when you install a program, there are registry entries installed in the registry. Simply cutting a program and moving it elsewhere doesn't move those registry entries and thus now a cut program pasted somewhere else becomes broken cause it can't find its required registry entries. (keeping things simple). In this case, it's best to uninstall and reinstall the program in the location you want. User created files and folder like Word doc, photos, music files can easily be cut and pasted anywhere. Programs like Photoshop can't because of the registry entries.

The other way of moving things is moving OS folders to other drives like that linked in TrashZone's post. I personally like keeping all my OS files and folders on the same drive to include the Pictures, Documents, Music, and Videos folders. If stuff in the Picutres or Music folder gets too large I'll move them to save space. This is why, given today's prices for SSD drives, I wouldn't advertise anything less than a 256gig SSD drive. You can still keep the OS together, and add another HD for holding overflow and installing other programs likes games to another added larger drive.

During install of a program, you can tell it where you want to install by usually choosing "custom install" choosing where you want to program or game to install. Say you want to install a game - instead of letting the game install on C-Drive, you can instead choose "Custom install" and tell the game to install on D or a drive of your choosing. I do this all the time for my games because my C-drive cannot hold my entire game directory nearly 1TB of games.

I've also got all my music files on a different drive, even though the "Music" folder is located on C-Drive. That even though iTunes for example will install some files and folders to the Music folder on C, the actual music files are on my H drive. I simply tell iTunes to look in that folder to play music.

Again, plenty of options, it just depends on what you want to do.

 

Hi all
About to eat dinner, so will take a proper look shortly, but just wanted to say "thanks!"... David

 

There are some good tips above. Programs should generally be installed on the SSD. You might want to consider installing large programs such as games and Adobe photo products on the hard drive to save space.

You can use Driver Store Explorer to delete old unused drivers which can be large (e.g. GPU). Select "Select Old Drivers" then taking care right click each one you don't want to delete. See https://github.com/lostindark/Driver...lorer/releases

Another tool to use with care is Wise Disk Cleaner Wise Disk Cleaner - Free Disk Cleanup and Defrag Tool I would use CCleaner first before you try this. Note you can use CCleaner to delete unwanted restore points which can take up significant space.

Yoou can use Tree Size Free to see which folders / programs are taking up space and remove those you don't need TreeSize Free - Quickly Scan Directory Sizes and Find Space Hogs

 

I would consider using OneDrive to save your documents to and upgrade to the latest version so you get the files on demand feature.

 

The other thing too is that with a 128GB drive, its going to fill up fast as the OS is going to consume close to 30% with a clean install.

Another thing to do is to reduce the amount of space given to system restores.

 

It's not as useful as it was with HDDs.
Resume could be faster than boot with a HDD but boot up time with a SSD is fast.
SSD + sleep is usually adequate (esp. with a laptop with a battery) - but yours is a desktop.
Ultimately it's a trade-off- are you fearful of power outages if using sleep?
You have a small SSD, so it's a space saver.
(Try running Windirstat (free) as per my post and find hiberfil.sys).

See discussion on net: (but these days you can ignore arguments about excessive read/write) e.g.
Hibernation - turn off - why? (except for capacity) | The SSD Review and Technology X Forums

 

A size of 128 Gb for an SSD should be more than enough. In my case W10 + many programmes + 11 Gb restore points amount to about 38 Gb on the SSD. This might temporary increase to 55 GB when an upgrade has taken place (windows.old still present).
A few cleaning possibilities are already mentioned. I would add that I disabled file history and windows search (they may occupy a lot of space). For searching much better/faster searching programmes are available (for instance I use Wise Jetsearch). Regularly I image the SSD (Macrium Reflect) and backup the data disk to an external disk. Don't forget to put on the system protection of the C disk. Standard it is set off by Windows, but it may help to recover unwanted changes on your C disk.

 

I've just clean installed Windows 7 on a 128GB SSD on an old PC then upgraded it to Windows 10 FCU. The installation is c. 15GB for Windows and a few utilities. 128GB is quite adequate unless you are going to start installing large programs (e.g. games).

 

I'd replace that 128 GB SSD with a 512 GB. Then I'd no longer have to scrimp.
It's cheap, so go for it.