Uh, weird things happening to my computer...

Clarify what? I was asking you what's the difference between the 3.

I was thinking the same thing, about maleware. But I had to uninstall my maleware program to free some disk space.

Do you know what "Heaping" refers to? I figured it was like when you install a program, run it for a while, then don't use it, so you uninstall it. Then not all the program files are gone, and they start "heaping" on top of each other, taking up HDD Space. Am I close?

 

Sin

Let's take one step a time.

1. Goto My Computer. Right Click on your C: drive -> properties. A new window would open with lots of data in it. We are interested in Used Space, Free Space & Capacity. Note them down & post it here.
2. While you are there, you would notice that there is a button named "Disk Cleanup ". Click it & follow the prompts. Again note the above numbers & post them here.

 

Sorry about that. From your post it did not look like a question.

Sorry again. Never heard of "Heaping ". Heap is the closest I can remember offhand [MS DOS/Assembly days].

Its true that when you uninstall programs, some programs leave back files & registry entries. You either have to install/uninstall a lot of programs to get into this mess or you have a very small hard disk. Manual intervention is required in this case.

 

Sin & Sin again
Head over here to download CleanUp! and then install it and run it. The only setting I would change from the default configuration relates to Cookies - leave that one unchecked but leave the rest of the settings as they are.

Run this tool and let us know what kind of space you managed to free up. I've also seen malware that plug up a machine's free space pretty quickly but noahdfear is the man to talk to re: this. Perhaps you should take a look at the introductory message at the top of that forum and follow the directions as outlined.

On your Gateway, I can only offer my condolences but the Attorney General in the State where you purchased it (their location not yours) probably can assist you. It's definately worth contacting them.

 

I hope the cleanup tool works for you, but I have not seen large amounts of space being freed up with those.

Look at what the old computer was originally used for. If it was for business, it may have a gigantic email archive file which I find happens often where I work. If it was say, used for gaming, there may be large numbers of old saved games files. Even if you uninstall the program or game, the saved files will not be removed and you are expected to delete them yourself (when you uninstall a program you may see "some files were not able to be removed... ").

If there were several users on the old computer, they may have large user accounts. Check in Control Panel -> User Accounts if there are Users you can remove.

Using Windows Explorer in Details view may let you see the size of the files and folders. Try a "folder size" program eg
http://majorgeeks.com/ExplorerXP_d4201.html

The cleanup program may identify the "temporary" files, but you may need to find the leftover "saved" files.

Matt

 

Hi RS, thank you so very much for sticking with me through this. Maybe it will get fixed. I was totally overwhelmed this morning when all the questions came to me all at once.

Ok, before Clean Up - 9107 KB
After Clean Up (I hit disk clean up again) - 32 KB

1. Used Space - 72,895,090,688 bytes or 67.8 GB
2. Free Space - 21,528,576 bytes or 20.5 MB

Is that all you wanted to know? I am going to ask something off THIS topic - can I reformat without a working CD-ROM? (I'm really not this dumb when it comes to computers, but I feel like I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place with this particular problem)

Waiting to hear from ya!

Sin

 

IF and WHEN we fix this particular problem, can this be the 2nd item we work on please? Over the years, I've uninstalled numerous programs, so I know there's a "HEAP" of junk files on my computer just sitting there

C Ya!

Sin

 

Sin, if you are willing to download and run Tree File Size, save the report and email it to me, I would be happy to peruse it for things that I could safely recommend you remove. The exe is only about 753KB in size, so you shouldn't have a problem saving it to the drive.

Have a look in C:\Program Files and remove any folders belonging to software you KNOW you have uninstalled, then empty the recycle bin.

 

Hi Matt!

Thank you for replying again

I use CleanUp! and have used it for several years. I also use CCleaner (**** Cleaner). I absolutely LOVE CleanUp!

I went to the link that you provided, and it says to update my drivers? I don't want my drivers updated through a 3rd party, I hope you can understand that. But what you say it's supposed to do, "Using Windows Explorer in Details view may let you see the size of the files and folders. Try a "folder size" program eg
http://majorgeeks.com/ExplorerXP_d4201.html " - but I didn't see that part. Let me go back and look and I'll let you know

Thank you!

Sin

 

Hi Rockstar! Thank you for replying.

Yea, CleanUp! always cleans up at least 1 MB. Since I can't run it while I've got Windows open, I'll post what it cleans up when I get off the Internet....unless there's a way to check my last scan while I'm on here right now? I have no clue.

C Ya!

Sin

 

Hey Rockstar....what did you mean when you said "I've also seen malware that plug up a machine's free space pretty quickly but noahdfear is the man to talk to re: this." <--are you saying a maleware plug=in is not a good thing? I didn't have one, but it would have been nice to have a plug in "Perhaps you should take a look at the introductory message at the top of that forum and follow the directions
as outlined." <---Which forum? Can you provide me a link? I feel so dumb sometimes.

Thanks!

Sin

 

Hey Noah, this old Compaq was purchased from my dad to me as a gift on my birthday 5 (or more) years ago. So I don't now exactly what it was built for....i.e. Business, Personal, etc. I've used it for gaming and personal. The business didn't happen until the first of the year. I had NO problems with the computer until a few months ago. I'm trying to figure out what was installed/uninstalled to keep certain files on here to make my C Drive have such low level disk space

Thank you

Sin

P.S. - How can I find the leftover "saved" files in that program?

 

Should I download the Maleware program again? I mean, before we get the low level HDD space fixed?

C Ya'll!

Sin

P.S. - Is there a low level HDD space recovery software?

 

Hi Noah, I want to thank you also for helping me out

I had TreeFileSize (Not the freeware version), but I didn't know what I was supposed to use it for. There's so many diff. programs in there and I didn't want to mess up my PC more than it already is....make sense? But you told me what you want to do, so I can do that

How can we exchange emails without everybody seeing them? NO OFFENSE!!!! I just don't want more email than I need

Let me know about the email, I'm up for anything

Sin

 

You can attach the report to an email to me, with RE: smitRem in the subject line to keep it from being filtered. Since you're trying to make space, I'd recommend for the time being to NOT download and/or install anything else just yet. Just a suggestion .... stop thinking about low level or an other level recovery software. As has been said already, Delete + Empty Recycle bin = free space, and that's all you need.

 

OK, Dave (noahdfear) has taken a look and is prepared to investigate your "file size" report. Take the opportunity

For game Save files... If the game is still installed, start the game, go to the Save (or Load) section and there should be an option to delete them. If the game is no longer installed, you will need to find where the saved files were kept (try a search for the game's name or manufacturer), you can look through the Program Files folder. The game saves may have been put into your My Documents folder.

You have filled ~75GB of space, it may be due to gigantic programs (eg game programs and their save files), it may be due to one or two gigantic files (eg email archive files) or it may be due to lots and lots of little files (picture files?).

If you have backed up to the internet storage sites, it won't delete those "cloned" files off your system, they will still be there taking up space.

Cleaner programs will target unnecessary files, If you have run cleaning programs and they have only removed 20MB, the rest are "necessary" files or those you have created, cleaners won't remove those.

You keep asking about "reclaiming space ". If cleaning programs have removed as much as they can, you will need to uninstall or delete those that you have created and are considered "necessary ".

Rockster mentioned malware. Some malware can create nuisance files that just fill up your hard disk space.

As I said, have your data in two places, maybe on the internet backup sites and an external drive or on CD/DVD (optical disks), but then, you will need to delete it off your old computer's C: drive to make more space. You will not get a program to reclaim space if the space is filled with files you have created yourself or malware has filled with "nuisance" files.

File compression may be an option, I would prefer to do backup, then delete the original files.

Matt
PS, the bright coloured fonts can be hard to read. They are usually used for highlighting a section of the post.
PPS, you are doing a good job in providing feedback for our suggestions

 

haha, I think I have every program there is to clean up my hard drive. I have ATF and I'll post the outcome when I get back home this morning. Doctors....ugh

Thanks!

Sin

 

sinnimon mentioned in email to me that her recycle bin is inaccessible.

I have a registry fix for you to try. I do not recall where I got it, but I have placed it in a self-extracting executable for ease of use.

Click here then select Open (Run) on the download dialog.
If you prefer to Save it to the drive, just double click the restorerecyclebin.exe file to run it.
You should be prompted with a message requesting to merge the information to the registry.
Select Yes
You should then get a message that the information was successfully added.
Restart the machine and see if the recycle bin is now accessible.


You mentioned in the email that you downloaded AIO Internet explorer. I have an irresistible urge to ask, WHY? You are trying to free up space, not add more to it. Did you miss my statement in a previous post?

I realize you are anxious to make space on the drive, however, downloading and installing more programs is counter-active. Please, do not install or download anything else other than the fix I suggested above, at least until we have created a considerable amount of breathing room (no less than 15% free space). You should also be concentrating on uploading personal files; documents, pictures, music, etc to the online storage sites and then deleting the local copy (make absolutely sure it is safely uploaded first!). After deleting, empty the recycle bin to allocate it's place on the drive as free space.


Since you have not sent the TreeFileSize report yet, I'd like to request that you save it in HTML form.