Windows 10: What's the story with Win10's WINSXS directory?

There's been a lot written about Win7's ever-expanding WINSXS subdirectory. In my Win7 install (which started out as a clean install) WINSXS is now 9.5GB in size. Granted, my system is several years old, but I know at some point the size or complexity of WINSXS is going to force me to reinstall my OS.

Does Win10 handle this issue any better? Are there any utilities available to clean up WINSXS? MS provides cleanup utilities for the major Win7 updates, but there is no way to clean up WINSXS after de-installing 3rd party software. It would be nice is Win10 provided a way to do this.

:)

 

Security and access

What about security on Windows 10S? Are there the same 'rules' as with Windows 10? I've read about the

difference between Win10 and Win 10 S but there wasn't any word about security peculiarities.

 

Upgrade from Windows 8.1 Single User to Windows 10 Pro and also to install Ubuntu 14 along side

Hi

Please help upgrade from Windows 8.1 Single User to Windows 10 Pro and also to install Ubuntu 14 along side just in case as Windows Update is not working.



Here's the batch script given by Microsoft Answer Desk:

cd\

fsutil resource setautoreset true C:\

echo "Resetting Attributes"

secedit /configure /cfg %windir%\inf\defltbase.inf /db defltbase.sdb /verbose

Echo "Registering Important Windows Files"

REGSVR32 VBSCRIPT.DLL /S

REGSVR32 JSCRIPT.DLL /S

REGSVR32 SCRRUN.DLL /S

REGSVR32 DISPEX.DLL /S

REGSVR32 MSSCRIPT.DLL /S

REGSVR32 SOFTPUB.DLL /S

REGSVR32 WINTRUST.DLL /S

REGSVR32 INITPKI.DLL /S

REGSVR32 URLMON.DLL /S

REGSVR32 DSSENH.DLL /S

REGSVR32 MSXML.DLL /S

REGSVR32 MSXML2.DLL /S

REGSVR32 MSXML3.DLL /S

REGSVR32 RSAENH.DLL /S

REGSVR32 GPKCSP.DLL /S

REGSVR32 SCCBASE.DLL /S

REGSVR32 SLBCSP.DLL /S

REGSVR32 CRYPTDLG.DLL /S

REGSVR32 MSSIP32.DLL /S

sc config "trustedinstaller" start= auto

sc config "bits" start= auto

sc config "cryptsvc" start= auto

sc config "W32Time" start= auto

echo "Stopping Services"

net stop wuauserv

net stop bits

Net Stop cryptsvc

REGSVR32 C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\WUAUENG.DLL /S

REGSVR32 C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\WUAUENG1.DLL /S

REGSVR32 C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\WUAPI.DLL /S

REGSVR32 C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\ATL.DLL /S

REGSVR32 C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\WUCLTUI.DLL /S

REGSVR32 C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\WUPS.DLL /S

REGSVR32 C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\IUENGINE.DLL /S

REGSVR32 C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\WUWEB.DLL /S

Reg delete HKLM\Components /v PendingXmldentifier

Reg delete HKLM\Components /v NextQueueEntryIndex

Reg delete HKLM\Components /v AdvancedInstallersNeedResolving

Reg delete HKLM\COMPONENTS /v StoreDirty

Reg delete "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\WindowsUpdate" /f

reg delete "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer" /f

Echo "Taking Ownership"

takeown /f %systemroot%\winsxs\Temp /r

takeown /f %systemroot%\winsxs\pending.xml

takeown /f %systemroot%\winsxs\pending.grl

takeown /f %systemroot%\SoftwareDistribution /r

takeown /f %systemroot%\system32\catroot2 /r

Echo "Giving Permissions to the necessary folders"

cacls %systemroot%\winsxs\Temp /g "everyone":f /t

cacls %systemroot%\winsxs\pending.xml /g everyone:f

cacls %systemroot%\winsxs\pending.grl /g everyone:f

cacls %systemroot%\SoftwareDistribution /g "everyone":f

cacls %systemroot%\system32\catroot2 /g "everyone":f

attrib -r -s -h "%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files" /s /d

rd /s /q %LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files

md %LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files /s

attrib +s +h "%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files" /s /d

echo "Clearing corrupted windows updates history"

del %systemroot%\winsxs\Temp /s /f /q

rd /s /q %systemroot%\winsxs\Temp\PendingRenames

rd /s /q %systemroot%\winsxs\Temp\PendingDeletes

del %systemroot%\winsxs\pending.xml

del %systemroot%\winsxs\pending.grl

rd /s /q %systemroot%\softwaredistribution

Echo "Deleted Software Ditribution Sucessfully"

rd /s /q %systemroot%\system32\catroot2

Echo "Deleted catroot2 Sucessfully"

pause

Thanks

 

The large size of the winsxs folder is more apparent than real. The NTFS file system has long had the feature whereby a single copy of a file can appear in 2 or more folders and this feature is used in the winsxs folder. This saves considerable disk space. Even if the folder were deleted (NOT recommended) you would find the space savings much less than anticipated. This feature has been in place since Vista.

 

The "problem" was largely fixed in Windows 8. The issue was that Windows Explorer was not aware of hard linked files and would count them multiple times, over-inflating the size of the folder than it really was. In Windows 8, Explorer was fixed so it counted the disk space correctly.

That's not to say that there wasn't cleanup that could be done as well. dism in Windows 8 was also improved to provide a cleanup function for WinSXS to remove old Windows update files. A patch was released for Windows 7 that added the same feature to Disk Cleanup.

 

Just run: Dism.exe /Online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup /ResetBase

WinSxS Folder (Component Store) - Clean Up in Windows 8.1

 

My system is Win7, not Win8, so the methods described in that article don't work for me. However, I did try this:

Dism.exe /online /Cleanup-Image /spsuperseded

but it found no service pack backup files.

Nice try though/

 

? > Clean Up the WinSxS Folder

 

Hello bbinnard,

You should post at our sister site www.sevenforums.com for Windows 7 issues. *Smile

 

I found that while searching for a Win10 fix ... the article states :