# Hard Drive Losing Space. Tried Everything And Still Losing It Can Someone Help Me!



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

Hi i just joined up this forum cause I have a major problem with my hard drive on Windows Vista Home. My HDD has 141GB and I now have 119GB this may be alot still but of course I wanna sort this sooner rather than later before this eats my entire hard drive out eventually.

Ive done virus scans and its all clean, ive disabled the system restore, ive done so many disk cleanups, ive done so many CCleaners but still to no avail its definatly something within the computer thats eating the space.

can someone help me if they have any knowledge of this, thnx alot


----------



## Lead3 (Jun 14, 2006)

Try this program (it's free). It will show a tree of all programs and files on your drive so you can see what is using up your space. Install it and right click the icon and select "Run as administrator". The only thing it does not show are your page file, pagefile.sys and the hybernate file, hyberfil.sys. These can be 4 to 8 gb depending on the system settings.
http://www.jam-software.com/freeware...shtml#treesize


----------



## tosh9i (Aug 3, 2006)

I think Lead3 means this one:

http://www.jam-software.com/freeware/index.shtml

Note to lead3: Your link lead to: http://www.jam-software.com/[B]freeware*...*shtml[/B]#treesize


----------



## Lead3 (Jun 14, 2006)

Something happened to the link. Thanks.


----------



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

ok thnx alot but i need some clues on where this file might be, i mean where would be the likely place this thing could be hiding. just a simple guess, cause im not too professional with these things and i think ive used these treesize things before.

but just didnt know how to use it much. although another question i have kaspersky anti virus and scanned about my whole system and it shows no viruses do u maybe thing that program sux and the worm or virus might still be hiding in my comp.

it could be tons of possibilities like. anyways reply when yous can thnx alot. im liking this forum already :]


----------



## tosh9i (Aug 3, 2006)

can you give us a screenshot of the results you get from treesize?


----------



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

gladly, here is the screenshot with the results like you asked for on this link.

http://img502.imageshack.us/img502/1453/treesizescreenshotya2.jpg


----------



## Lead3 (Jun 14, 2006)

Restart Treesize by right clicking it and select "Run as administartor" so we can see the size of the System Volume Information.


----------



## tosh9i (Aug 3, 2006)

deleted


----------



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

ok i checked it again and done exactly as you said but no need to do a screenshot its not the system volume file thats doin it, its at completely 0MB. and what does tosh9i mean by "deleted"?

although also it said beside the volume file that it was access denied but still showed 0MB dunno if thats something or not. any more oppinions on what i can do next?


----------



## tosh9i (Aug 3, 2006)

willgutrectomy said:


> ok i checked it again and done exactly as you said but no need to do a screenshot its not the system volume file thats doin it, its at completely 0MB. and what does tosh9i mean by "deleted"?
> 
> although also it said beside the volume file that it was access denied but still showed 0MB dunno if thats something or not. any more oppinions on what i can do next?


It's nothing, I was posting a question, but then I saw that it was already answered.

Honestly, I don't see anything wrong at all, unless I missed something. On average, Vista will take up about 15 GB of space.


----------



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

yeah thats because of system restore but i did disable that. but u know i keep checkin my hard drive space and it keeps goin down like. even when im not downloading anything. tried phoning a releative today and he says it could be a hacker. although my firewall's are up so i doubt it.

but i definatly know something is wrong like and eventually if i cant find this problem my hard drive will just keep losing space and eventually wont have any left and my computer will be screwed.

so yeah if anyone has any other ideas about this just let me know and thnx for all the help so far. i can definatly see this is very hard to figure out.


----------



## tosh9i (Aug 3, 2006)

GO to this page and scroll to posting #10 and read from there and on:

http://forums.techguy.org/windows-vista/545460-vista-taking-up-hard-drive.html


----------



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

ok i read it but ive already tried these things you know. ive turned system restore off and also tried that registry editor thing that it showed on that forum. still i dont get why its still eating away at the space. its definatly something strange like.

thnx alot for the link though.


----------



## tosh9i (Aug 3, 2006)

how about "where" you're losing space. open up Treesize and compare it to the one you posted earlier. Do you see any differences in the sizes of the folders?


----------



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

great post thanx and yes it is different, within the Windows, Program Data And Users folders they have all changed size. so it must be something within those 3 files that is doing it.

so whats the best thing to do now then?


----------



## tosh9i (Aug 3, 2006)

how much different


----------



## Lead3 (Jun 14, 2006)

According to your screen shot you have about 25GB of space used on your hard drive.
You say your drive is 141GB with now 119GB remaining? Is the drive 160GB drive?
What makes you believe that the drive is shrinking?


----------



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

well the windows and program data files have went up a few hundred MB, and the users file has went up like 60MB.

and i believe it cause i check the drive properties all the time and it is always shrinking everytime i look at it once in a while you know.


----------



## tosh9i (Aug 3, 2006)

okay, we need to narrow down to a "specifc" folder or file. So you're going to have to do more comparing. Basically, click on the plus signs to expand those folders several layers depper, not just one directory, but the next and the next one to view all the directories. Take a screen shot of that and save it. From there, I guess you'll have to wait a couple of minutes. Then, open Treesize again and compare them.


----------



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

right then i'll do that now then watch the rest of my film haha and then check it again and i'll get back to yous on the report. for now thanks for all your help tosh9i, you too Lead3


----------



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

oh wait never mind and i think ive found this son of a... and who would believe it, its from a AOL file. AOL is my internet provider and for some reason there is a folder it seems to be a log of a load of stupid stuff. 

but anyways i wont go any further until yous have a look at this new screenshot. it shows the log i did of the big AOL file in the program data section thats the file that is changing cause i saw it for myself. have a look and tell me what i should do with it. hopefully delete it hehe ;]

http://img145.imageshack.us/img145/4117/treesizescreenshotbl5.jpg


----------



## tosh9i (Aug 3, 2006)

I see that those folders are bigger by a couple hudred MB like you said, but there's one thing I don't get. At the bottom of those screenshots, it tells you how much "free space" you have.

The first one shows at: 121,542 MB
and the second one at: 121,288 MB

But still, the number of objects is different by 2300


----------



## tosh9i (Aug 3, 2006)

Then again, at the top of those screenshots it shows:

The first one shows at: 26,315 MB
and the second one at: 25,045 MB

that's a difference of 1.3 GB


So, the amount of free space hardly changed, but the amount of space used has changed dramatically.


----------



## willgutrectomy (Oct 24, 2007)

haha thats whatever man i deleted that file and its wayyy back up to 127GB now. so now ive made a log of what space is tooken off and i'll check once again incase its anything else.

but as far as it goes ive think ive solved it. with the good ole tech support forum's help of course.

but listen i cant thank you guys enough for your help bah i was on that lame tech republic forum and they didnt help me out one bit the same with computing.net.

haha but anyways i wont build my hopes up but im sure thats it solved. thanx again guys. i'll definatly stay here incase i need more help with things which will probably be soon haha. :]


----------



## walshdarren (Jan 7, 2010)

Fair play to ya lead 3, that treesize found what was taking up all the space thanks a mill!! it was ableton for me if you have the same problem anyone ya need to clear the cache in ableton settings...


----------

