# windows 10 c drive suddenly full unknown?



## okeee (May 14, 2006)

my c:\ drive used to be around 40 GB, max size is 75 GB. but suddenly I received a warning that only 7 GB free space is left. I already deleted temp files, etc. but that hardly changed the size. what is weird, when I click on 'properties' of all the files in C: drive, including hidden system folders, the total amount is only aobut 35 GB.


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## Corday (Mar 3, 2010)

If the drive is very old, the reading is sometimes wrong in Windows 10. Another possibility is malware.


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## spunk.funk (May 13, 2010)

Attach all External USB HDD's to your computer and Empty your Recycle Bin , as any files sent to the Recycle Bin from an External HDD will also show up in the C:'s Recycle Bin which will show a larger size then the actual C: drive.


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## johnwill (Sep 26, 2002)

This is a great utility to locate what's filling a drive.

*WinDirStat - Windows Directory Statistics*


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## WndrWmn (Oct 25, 2012)

Hello,

I don't know if when you referred to temp files you also meant your old Windows Updates/previous versions so that is an excellent place to gain disk space back. Here's an article directly from Microsoft on how to do that:

Delete your previous version of Windows (microsoft.com) 

Also you should run check disk (chkdsk) and choose repair all now switch here's an article from Norton on doing that and the article also has a link to an additional article from Microsoft:

Run Microsoft CHKDSK from the command line (norton.com) 


Sincerely,

Wonder Woman


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## okeee (May 14, 2006)

johnwill said:


> This is a great utility to locate what's filling a drive.
> 
> *WinDirStat - Windows Directory Statistics*


the tool shows the same, 32GB used by C: drive, while if I check _my computer_, 50GB is used. 

When I checked earlier, even 70GB was used. the strange thing is, I did not delete anything from C: drive and suddenly now only 50 GB is used? This is very confusing, what is going on? 

and still, 32GB vs 52 GB used, that is still a difference of 20 GB that is not shown? 

including screenshots from the windirstat tool (showing 32,4 GB used) and *my computer *(showing about 52 GB used)

the HDD is quite new, bought last year sept. also I have no previous windows versions installed, its a new pc, and only this win 10 has been installed on it by myself.


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## SpywareDr (Jun 15, 2013)

Malware possibly? 









The Abuse of Alternate data stream hasn't disappeared


Abuses of Alternate Data Streams has for a long time occured the wild, however more recently it is being used to hide a malicious payload in the file system




www.deepinstinct.com


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## pbug56 (Sep 20, 2008)

okeee said:


> the tool shows the same, 32GB used by C: drive, while if I check _my computer_, 50GB is used.
> 
> When I checked earlier, even 70GB was used. the strange thing is, I did not delete anything from C: drive and suddenly now only 50 GB is used? This is very confusing, what is going on?
> 
> ...


How did you buy such a tiny hard drive? What's it 10 years old or more?


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## Sgayres (Jun 11, 2010)

okeee said:


> my c:\ drive used to be around 40 GB, max size is 75 GB. but suddenly I received a warning that only 7 GB free space is left. I already deleted temp files, etc. but that hardly changed the size. what is weird, when I click on 'properties' of all the files in C: drive, including hidden system folders, the total amount is only aobut 35 GB.
> View attachment 332824


Another suggestion is to delete the contents of C:Windows/Temp. I've freed to tons of space by deleting the contents of this folder. Only the contents. Leave the Temp folder.


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## SpywareDr (Jun 15, 2013)

pbug56 said:


> How did you buy such a tiny hard drive? What's it 10 years old or more?


Keep in mind that back then SSDs were still a lot more expensive than a HDD. For example, the first commercial flash-based SSD was shipped by SanDisk in 1991. It was a 20 MB (~not GB~) SSD in a PCMCIA configuration, and sold OEM for around $1,000 and was used by IBM in a ThinkPad laptop. That price puts it at $50,000 (USD) per gigabyte.


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## CindyTheQueen (11 mo ago)

okeee said:


> my c:\ drive used to be around 40 GB, max size is 75 GB. but suddenly I received a warning that only 7 GB free space is left. I already deleted temp files, etc. but that hardly changed the size. what is weird, when I click on 'properties' of all the files in C: drive, including hidden system folders, the total amount is only aobut 35 GB.
> View attachment 332824


Run Directory Report as an administrator. That way it can scan protected files.
It will show you where your disk space is being used


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## johnwill (Sep 26, 2002)

I hate to suggest the obvious, but did you open an administrator command prompt and run *CHKDSK C: /F *The computer will reboot and run the command and clean up any file system corruption. Obviously, something is consuming the 25GB of storage.


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