Finally made the move to Vista x64... but did not expect this

[rudder]

My windows folder is nearly 20 gigs! Is this normal for Vista Ultimate? Is there a bunch of crap I can uninstall?

I had mostly been using XP64, but decided to go with Server 2008 since I got a copy at the microsoft 2008 launch event (same place I got vista). Server 2008 windows directory is about 40% the size of vista's so I don't know if it is all the ultimate fluff or not. I really liked 2008 but some software I regularly used just did not work right under 2008.

So far so good with Vista. I installed it with 8 gigs... when I was too lazy to remove the ram despite hearing problems about BSOD's during install. This was the SP1 version so maybe that had something to do with it. Absolutely no other issues what so ever installing it on a gigabyte P35-ds3l mobo.

Unfortunately, I did install it over my old XP32 partition which was only 30 gigs... not realizing most of it would be eaten up by the Vista install.

 

[mc866]

My Vista 64 ultimate install was around 12-13 gb. Did you delete the temporary install files? If you are looking to do a smaller footprint install take a look at vLite.

 

[Kingbee13]

I just checked mine is 17gigs I havent tried to lighten it or anything, harddrives are cheap, and spacious these days 17gigs is just a drop in the bucket even on my "small" 300gb veliciraptor

 

[Ryland]

My windows directory is probably up around 20+gig at this point since Vista never deletes any drivers/dll's but keeps copies of them for various software to use. I would love to find a way to reduce that footprint instead of having to repartition AGAIN.

 

[Kingbee13]

Originally posted by: Ryland
My windows directory is probably up around 20+gig at this point since Vista never deletes any drivers/dll's but keeps copies of them for various software to use. I would love to find a way to reduce that footprint instead of having to repartition AGAIN.

maybe its the volume shadow copy thats eating away your drive space, but I'm not sure where windows places those files, I would hve thought in the user directory but whereever it is, turning it off will certianly reduce the OS footprint

 

[bsobel]

Originally posted by: Kingbee13

Originally posted by: Ryland
My windows directory is probably up around 20+gig at this point since Vista never deletes any drivers/dll's but keeps copies of them for various software to use. I would love to find a way to reduce that footprint instead of having to repartition AGAIN.

maybe its the volume shadow copy thats eating away your drive space, but I'm not sure where windows places those files, I would hve thought in the user directory but whereever it is, turning it off will certianly reduce the OS footprint

They are in the System Volume Information folder off the root, and please don't turn it off.

 

[Kingbee13]

Originally posted by: bsobel

Originally posted by: Kingbee13

Originally posted by: Ryland
My windows directory is probably up around 20+gig at this point since Vista never deletes any drivers/dll's but keeps copies of them for various software to use. I would love to find a way to reduce that footprint instead of having to repartition AGAIN.

maybe its the volume shadow copy thats eating away your drive space, but I'm not sure where windows places those files, I would hve thought in the user directory but whereever it is, turning it off will certianly reduce the OS footprint

They are in the System Volume Information folder off the root, and please don't turn it off.

yea, my bad wasn't recomending it be turned off but it did sound that way reading my own post, my point is I'm not sure (unless we are talking about a laptop or small SSD) why anyone cares how much space Vista uses as I said in a previous post in this thread HDs are spacious and cheap

 

[tatteredpotato]

I have issues with my winsxs folder being 13.1GB alone.

 

[RebateMonger]

Originally posted by: ObscureCaucasian
I have issues with my winsxs folder being 13.1GB alone.

The WinSXS folder in my seven-month-old Vista Business installation is about 7 GB. About half of my entire Windows folder, which is 13 GB.

 

[hclarkjr]

hah, i got you all beat mine is 22.7gb

 

[lxskllr]

My Windows folder from a 1yr old install is 20.7gb.

 

[RebateMonger]

The OP might consider extending the Vista System Partition size now, rather than battling it forever. This can supposedly be done by Vista itself. I haven't done it, since I don't use multiple partitions on drives anymore. But you'd likely have to copy any other partitions to your backup drive, delete them to free up contiguous free space on the drive, EXTEND the Vista System Partition using Vista's Disk Management, and then copy the other partiitions back to the hard drive.

A "too large" System Partition is good. A "too small" System Partition is bad. You can always store data in the free space on the System Partition and move it elsewhere later if you need to free up space.

 

[zerogear]

Might want to convert your drive to dynamic so you can resize the partition without having to install/reformat everything.

My Vista folder is 27GB, after a year and a half of having Vista installed. Doesn't bother me too much since my drive is 300GB.

 

[rudder]

Originally posted by: RebateMonger
The OP might consider extending the Vista System Partition size now, rather than battling it forever. This can supposedly be done by Vista itself. I haven't done it, since I don't use multiple partitions on drives anymore. But you'd likely have to copy any other partitions to your backup drive, delete them to free up contiguous free space on the drive, EXTEND the Vista System Partition using Vista's Disk Management, and then copy the other partiitions back to the hard drive.

A "too large" System Partition is good. A "too small" System Partition is bad. You can always store data in the free space on the System Partition and move it elsewhere later if you need to free up space.

I used a 75 gig raptor drive. I had it divided into two partions with my winxp64 install on the remainder of the drive. I really like XP64 and hate to see it go. But Vista is where it is at... so I may just format it and devote the entire volume to vista. I will try to do it through vista and see how it goes. If it doesn't work, no big deal the only thing on there now is vista and a few drivers.

The older raptor is so noisy though I may just ditch it and get another seagate.

 

[XBoxLPU]

Originally posted by: lxskllr
My Windows folder from a 1yr old install is 20.7gb.

About the same here

 

[Raduque]

My Vista Home Premium install is 2 years and 2 days old and takes up 12.5gb.

 

[VinDSL]

Heh! My W2K Pro install is 9 years old and takes up 2.51gb...

 

[pcslookout]

Originally posted by: VinDSL

Heh! My W2K Pro install is 9 years old and takes up 2.51gb...

You got to love Windows 2000 Pro! I know I always will! Even though it can't really be used anymore unless you want to have no more driver updates. I tried it a while back I liked it but the only thing I hated is even with a lot of ram. 4 GB I know it could only see 3.5 GB but whenever I alt tab out of a game it would take a few seconds longer than windows xp or windows vista Yes I tested each different OS on the same pc. That sorta sucked. For some strange reason alt tab is a lot quicker on windows xp and windows vista than windows 2000 when doing it in a game. Does anyone know why?

 

[Mem]

Originally posted by: VinDSL

Heh! My W2K Pro install is 9 years old and takes up 2.51gb...

Bah thats nothing try DOS 6.22 can your 2K fit on 3 floppies .

 

[soonerproud]

Originally posted by: rudder
The older raptor is so noisy though I may just ditch it and get another seagate.

A new mainstream Seagate drive is probably nearly as fast or faster than that old Raptor, not to mention quieter and a lot less heat and noise. The Veloci Raptor is just barely faster than these new perpendicular drives from Seagate and Western Digital.

 

[Spicedaddy]

System Restore eats up a lot of space in Vista.

 

[F1shF4t]

Originally posted by: soonerproud

Originally posted by: rudder
The older raptor is so noisy though I may just ditch it and get another seagate.

A new mainstream Seagate drive is probably nearly as fast or faster than that old Raptor, not to mention quieter and a lot less heat and noise. The Veloci Raptor is just barely faster than these new perpendicular drives from Seagate and Western Digital.

The only thing those old Raptors are still usefull at are OS drives. The seeks times do help make your system more responcive. I got two of my old raptors (74 gig 8mb and 16mb cache ones) in Raid 0 just to install windows on, got no other real use for then. (We're talking 100mb+ read speed with 6-7ms seek times, even towards the end of the drive)

Since I don't use them for anything else I don't care how much the windows folder uses. I think at the moment its something like 40 - 50 gig. (8 gig hybernation file + 8 gig page file + sytem restore adds up)

 

[ViRGE]

Originally posted by: Spicedaddy
System Restore eats up a lot of space in Vista.

15% of hard drive capacity, max.

 

[sourceninja]

Originally posted by: ViRGE

Originally posted by: Spicedaddy
System Restore eats up a lot of space in Vista.

15% of hard drive capacity, max.

It also has never worked in a situation where I thought it might be useful. Which is why I keep a real backup of my system (thanks clonezilla) for recovery purposes.

I've never had a case where my computer was having problems and system restore has fixed it. I've very case I've tried system restore it has made even more problems.

 

[Griswold]

Originally posted by: Mem

Originally posted by: VinDSL

Heh! My W2K Pro install is 9 years old and takes up 2.51gb...

Bah thats nothing try DOS 6.22 can your 2K fit on 3 floppies .

Pah 3 floppies! You dont need 3 floppies to boot DOS 6.x !