Need some computer help

[JoshH]

I have a laptop that keeps giving me a low disk space error. It says there isn't enough hard drive space on my 500 gb hard drive. When I go to computer and right click on the C drive to see the properties, it says there is 465 gb used and 2.65 mb free, but if I open the C drive and check each folder individually, I don't come up with anywhere near 465 gb of use. I am coming up with closer to 100 gb of files in all folders combined. I have done disk cleanups and defragged the hard drive multiple times. I cleared out about 20 gb of extra crap a few weeks ago, and now here I am again. I feel like there is something wrong, but I have no idea where to go from here. I know there are some actual computer gurus here, and I could use some help figuring this out.

 

[Chevy1925]

trying to remember what folder i had but it was some kind of folder in my "temp" files that was holding all the damn space on my hard drive at work.

quick seach on googles says go to the run screen (windows button + R) and enter %temp%, click run. then delete all files there. i didnt do that when i cleared it all but ill see what i can find/remember.

 

[IdahoRob]

Josh, i had the same issue. Go to the C drive>windows>temp and hit control A to highlight everything and hit delete. Then go into your recycle bin and empty it. I had to do this about once a month. I figured out how to stop it with help from the internet but forgot how i did it.

 

[Poltergeist]

Like Rob said above empty the recycle bin. Even though stuff is deleted it will still take up space until it is emptied.

 

[JoshH]

The temp folder had 4.7 mb in it, but I cleared it all out. The recycle bin was already empty. Its like I have a ghost file that is eating all my storage space, or my hard drive is bad and thinks it is full.

 

[IdahoRob]

Those porn videos take up a lot of space....:happy2:

 

[Chevy1925]

The temp folder had 4.7 mb in it, but I cleared it all out. The recycle bin was already empty. Its like I have a ghost file that is eating all my storage space, or my hard drive is bad and thinks it is full.

im still trying to remember the location (searching through my files). i have a 500gb HD on my computer as well. the file i found dropped me all the way from 497gb to 200gb used.

 

[Cougar281]

Grab treesize free. It'll go through the drive and tell you where all used space is.

Sent from my 2PZC5 using Tapatalk

 

[DAVe3283]

Grab treesize free. It'll go through the drive and tell you where all used space is.

That looks like a good program. I use SpaceSniffer, which is also free. Doesn't need installed, just unzip it to a thumb drive or something. Remember to right click and Run as Administrator, otherwise it can't see inside some system folders.

If this is Windows 10, Microsoft has been changing how upgrades work and the latest version (which you may or may not have at this point) reserves a large amount of disk space for updates.

Once you run SpaceSniffer (or TreeSize Free), and you find any folders are suspiciously large, you can Google them or post back here and we can try and help you know what is safe to delete.

 

[2004LB7]

I know windows 7 has this issue where it has trouble clearing temp files sometimes. It will also mis report the space used by them.

It is not normally in the standard [temp] folder in [windows]. It could be under a program temp folder, update folder, etc. The few that I've delt with required me to right click on each folder in the root directory and open the folder that reports being the largest. Then proceed to right click on each of the folders in there and open the largest one. Keep doing this until you find the one folder ( sometimes it's two more more hogging space) and depending on the content, delete it.

Sometimes a badly written program write protects or modifies the permissions of the files/folder but doesn't release them when it is done. This makes it impossible for Windows to deal with it. In this case you will likely need to with administrator rights take ownership and delete them

Kind of a slow process if you have lots of folders but works every time for me

 

[Woodster]

I have a laptop that keeps giving me a low disk space error. It says there isn't enough hard drive space on my 500 gb hard drive. When I go to computer and right click on the C drive to see the properties, it says there is 465 gb used and 2.65 mb free, but if I open the C drive and check each folder individually, I don't come up with anywhere near 465 gb of use. I am coming up with closer to 100 gb of files in all folders combined. I have done disk cleanups and defragged the hard drive multiple times. I cleared out about 20 gb of extra crap a few weeks ago, and now here I am again. I feel like there is something wrong, but I have no idea where to go from here. I know there are some actual computer gurus here, and I could use some help figuring this out.

What version of Windows are you running?

 

[Woodster]

The temp folder had 4.7 mb in it, but I cleared it all out. The recycle bin was already empty. Its like I have a ghost file that is eating all my storage space, or my hard drive is bad and thinks it is full.

That is not how HDD, SSD or NVMe drives work.

 

[Woodster]

Those porn videos take up a lot of space....:happy2:

Depends on what video format your using. Compress those large mp4 files for gigabytes of goodness. :woott:

 

[2004LB7]

That is not how HDD, SSD or NVMe drives work.

Hence the word "like"

It may not be how the drives work but it sure seems to be the way the software works. I've seen this issue on several occasions between xp, vista, 7 and 8. I haven't played around with 10 enough to see it but most seem to be on vista and 7. XP seemed to report more correctly but still suffered from temp file bloat

 

[JoshH]

Those porn videos take up a lot of space....:happy2:

That's what smart phones are for! :rofl:

Grab treesize free. It'll go through the drive and tell you where all used space is.

Sent from my 2PZC5 using Tapatalk

That looks like a good program. I use SpaceSniffer, which is also free. Doesn't need installed, just unzip it to a thumb drive or something. Remember to right click and Run as Administrator, otherwise it can't see inside some system folders.

If this is Windows 10, Microsoft has been changing how upgrades work and the latest version (which you may or may not have at this point) reserves a large amount of disk space for updates.

Once you run SpaceSniffer (or TreeSize Free), and you find any folders are suspiciously large, you can Google them or post back here and we can try and help you know what is safe to delete.

I will try one of those. Thank you.

I know windows 7 has this issue where it has trouble clearing temp files sometimes. It will also mis report the space used by them.

It is not normally in the standard [temp] folder in [windows]. It could be under a program temp folder, update folder, etc. The few that I've delt with required me to right click on each folder in the root directory and open the folder that reports being the largest. Then proceed to right click on each of the folders in there and open the largest one. Keep doing this until you find the one folder ( sometimes it's two more more hogging space) and depending on the content, delete it.

Sometimes a badly written program write protects or modifies the permissions of the files/folder but doesn't release them when it is done. This makes it impossible for Windows to deal with it. In this case you will likely need to with administrator rights take ownership and delete them

Kind of a slow process if you have lots of folders but works every time for me

This computer is running windows 7.

 

[Woodster]

First off, lets diagnose the hardware. No sense in trying to clear up space if the damn thing is dying.

Run chkdsk on the drive. There are several ways to do this. Let's try the easiest one first.

1. Right-click on the Start icon
2. Click Open "Windows Explorer"
3. On the left side of the window, click "Computer"
4. At the Hard Drives section, right-click on the volume you want to check for errors.
5. Click properties.
6. Go to tools tab.
7. At the "Error-checking" section click "Check now"
- Run the check disk utility: select "Scan and attempt recovery of bad sectors."

Report what you find...

Pro tip - you will want to invest in something with Win 10. Win 7 in "extended support" phase and will at "end of life" phase in Jan 2020.

 

[JoshH]

Run chkdsk on the drive. There are several ways to do this. Let's try the easiest one first.

1. Right-click on the Start icon
2. Click Open "Windows Explorer"
3. On the left side of the window, click "Computer"
4. At the Hard Drives section, right-click on the volume you want to check for errors.
5. Click properties.
6. Go to tools tab.
7. At the "Error-checking" section click "Check now"
- Run the check disk utility: select "Scan and attempt recovery of bad sectors."

Report what you find...

Pro tip - you will want to invest in something with Win 10. Win 7 in "extended support" phase and will at "end of life" phase in Jan 2020.

I had already tried all that. I just got done running one of the space checking programs suggested, and found a windows\temp folder that had 417 gb worth of files in it. I think it wasn’t showing up on my disk cleanup checks because I wasn’t running in administrator mode, and the directory was hidden from my user account. Thanks for all the help.

 

[JoshH]

Can anyone tell me what CbsPersist text documents and CAB files are? I have about 30 gb of those in c:\windows\logs\cbs. Also, there is about 10 gb worth of junk (from what I can tell) in the winsxs folder. Anyone know what the stuff in that folder is used for?

 

[2004LB7]

CbsPersist are for update logs. Good for diagnosis of failed updates. You can delete all of them

CAB are cabinet files. Somewhat similar to folders or zip files in that it contains multiple "files" within. There are common for installation setup files. Most likely can be deleted as they almost are never needed again or used as files for a program

 

[DAVe3283]

Can anyone tell me what CbsPersist text documents and CAB files are? I have about 30 gb of those in c:\windows\logs\cbs. Also, there is about 10 gb worth of junk (from what I can tell) in the winsxs folder. Anyone know what the stuff in that folder is used for?

CBS/CbsPersist are logs from Component Based Servicing (aka Windows Update). The logs are safe to delete. While you're in there, you can actually delete the whole C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution folder safely on Windows 7. It will make Windows Update take a LONG time the next time you run it, but that folder bloats up badly over time too. You will also lose the ability to uninstall previous updates, so choose wisely.

CAB files are archive files, and can be used for almost anything. If you don't know what program created them, I'd leave them alone, except in temp folders. You can delete those.

The WinSXS folder is a component store that uses a lot of symlinks. Because of that, it doesn't take as much disk space as it appears. You really don't want to mess with that folder if you don't have to.