what do I delete

gubby

I keep getting error message telling me that my hard drive is full and I need to delete some software.. problem is. I dont know what I can delete? I have around 6 adobe things on there and wonder if I need them all. if I install an upgrade of something does that mean I can uninstall whatever came before it? I also have two items that just will not delete for me.. one is an old printer that I dont use anymore and the other is picture gear from an old camcorder. any advice would be much appreciated. :cool:

Thrill

Get an external hard drive and transfer as much stuff over to it before deleting it. That way you'll be able to keep everything and free up your hard drive.

Ruu_Old

Normally an upgrade removes the older version first so probably won't make any difference. Do you have any large media files that you could burn to CD/DVD or maybe pick up an external hard drive for storage?

aidan_walsh

Ruu wrote: »

Normally an upgrade removes the older version first so probably won't make any difference. Do you have any large media files that you could burn to CD/DVD or maybe pick up an external hard drive for storage?

Some platforms and applications like .Net, Adobe Reader (IIRC) and Java tend to leave older versions behind.

Moving things like music and movies to an external HDD is a pretty good place to start, as is uninstalling any large applications or games that you no longer use.

Also, download CCleaner which will help you remove any old temp files that ay be sitting about taking up space. These can really build up if they are not purged every so often and depending on your computer use could be quite large.

calex71

+1 for CCleaner, spacemonger can also be very useful for working out whats taking upspace

DonkeyStyle \o/

I like treesize for figuring out where the space has gone.

Do you have multiple harddrives or partitions?
I find setting the swapfile from C:\ to some other partition tends to free up a gig or two, if C: is what windows is moaning about.

Other than that, a lot of programs like to leave their crap behind in C:\documents and settings\username\local settings\temp\

1+ on getting an external harddrive too... they're pretty cheap for a good 500Gigs of storage.

Overheal

you can download this program called WinDirStat at the bottom of the link. Essentially what it does is scans your hard drive and shows you in a very easy to read chart form where your files are on your drive, how big they are, etc.

Its really good for showing you at a glance where to start looking for space eg. Do you have too much music or too many programs? Do Video Files take up the most space on your hard drive?

It saves you hours of right clicking on folders trying to figure out how big they are.

muggyog

If you are running XP go into C:\WINDOWS\Temp and delete everyting. That might give you some breathing space.

Sam Vimes

as people have said, deleting software is not a good way to go about getting more space. Programs generally aren't very big so it's most likely something else taking up all your space

what size is your hard drive?

dr.bollocko

Just dont delete Hiberfil.sys even if it is very big!

will.i.amn't

You can search your whole drive for large files (without having to download new software). That might turn up a few things that can be safely deleted,e.g. there might be a few big video/audio files you no longer need.
In Windows XP:

1. Right click My computer
2. Search
3. All files and folders
4. What size is it?
5. Specify size
6. At least 10000 kB
7. Search

Then sort the results by size and examine the list.