# [SOLVED] Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space



## H22O22 (Oct 18, 2011)

Hi,

About a year ago I've been losing hard drive space. Around September 2010 I had nearly 200GB of free space and around December 2010 I was around 500MB. I checked daily and I had rapidly been losing 2-3GB a day. I have ignored this problem until today, but it's really starting to get on my nerves and needs to be dealt with. I ran Disk Cleanup a few months ago and it ended up freeing about 170GB of free space, but I rapidly lost it again. I ran it a second time once I lost it all and was only able to recover 80GB. Every time I run it, I'm able to recover less and less. Now it's only worth 12MB. Anytime I try to free up space, I lose it within a day. Please, any help is appreciated. Thanks in advanced.


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## joeten (Dec 4, 2008)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*

Hi and welcome to TSF what type of things do you use your computer for does it involve the use of large video files or watching on line video where you could have a build up of large temp files have you run your antivirus scanner have you run a disclean up and defrag,have you checked how much is being taken up by system restore
Help - Controlling Shadow Copies in Vista (and Windows 7!) Tips, Solutions & How Tos | PCMag.com


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## H22O22 (Oct 18, 2011)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*

I've run a defrag with no results, but I just did a quick test and watching Youtube videos seems to be the cause of the problem.


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## joeten (Dec 4, 2008)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*

Hi try this to clean temp files ATF-Cleaner.exe - www.atribune.org


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## Ninjaboi (Dec 27, 2010)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*

Hello H22022, welcome to TSF!

What internet browser do you use? Internet Explorer? FireFox? Chrome?


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## H22O22 (Oct 18, 2011)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*

I use Chrome, but I do use Firefox occasionally. While a Youtube video is playing, my free space goes down, but when I close the tab, I recover the memory.


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## Ninjaboi (Dec 27, 2010)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*

That's good that your recover your memory after you close the tab, which means that the temp file is deleted rather than being kept as a cache. Using the tool joeten suggested once a week or so should help keep your hard drive from losing free space due to cache reasons.


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## H22O22 (Oct 18, 2011)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*

Would you have any idea of how to recover the free space that has already been lost?


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## Ninjaboi (Dec 27, 2010)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*

You could try removing files in the Windows Temp directory.


Click *Start*, in the search box, type *CMD*.
Right click on *CMD* and choose run as Administrator.
In the command prompt type *ECHO %Temp%.*
Source(s):

Where is the Temporary folder? - Microsoft Answers

space on drive c is disappearing. - Microsoft Answers


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## H22O22 (Oct 18, 2011)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*

I've checked my Temp folder and there are no abnormally large files or large amount of files.


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## H22O22 (Oct 18, 2011)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*

It appears I have solved my problem, ha. 
Imageshack - quarantinetakingspace.png
I'm currently living on a college campus that requires an install of Symantec. It appears to cache a quarantine every time it runs a scan.


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## Ninjaboi (Dec 27, 2010)

*Re: Rapidly Losing Hard Drive Space*



H22O22 said:


> It appears I have solved my problem, ha.
> Imageshack - quarantinetakingspace.png
> I'm currently living on a college campus that requires an install of Symantec. It appears to cache a quarantine every time it runs a scan.


If that's the case, and Symantec is taking up all the space, there isn't much you can do other than change the settings to give it a set amount of space to work with when it comes to the cache it creates, or ask your campus if you can remove Symantec entirely ( not recommended though ).

If removing those cache's solves the problem and frees up your space on the hard drive, please mark this thread "Solved" by going to the top of the thread, select "Thread Tools", and select "Mark this thread Solved".


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