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hard drive filling up

Discussion in 'Windows XP' started by rerato, 2006/09/21.

  1. 2006/09/21
    rerato

    rerato Inactive Thread Starter

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    Hi. I recently woke up one morning only to find that my PC has no more space on it's hard drive. I restarted it and everything was fine. Since then, I've been keeping a close watch on my hard drive space. I keep checking for viruses, malware, or anything, but I haven't caught anything yet. I don't know why my hard drive is filling up, that after a few days, I have 10 GBs left when I shoul dhave nearly 30 GB free.. especially when I use my PC for mainly browsing or a little programming. Sometimes I'll update my iPod or play some Freecell, okay, you get the point. There's no reason that I'm causing this. Any ideas as to why and how I can stop this? It gets annoying having to reboot every few days to free up 10 or 20 GBs of space. Thanks for any tips or advice.
     
    rerato,
    #1
  2. 2006/09/22
    PeteC

    PeteC SuperGeek Staff

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    putang1080 - Welcome to the Board :)

    Strange one this - the fact that a reboot recovers the space suggests a massive build up of temporary files for some reason or another.

    When the drive is 'full' search for *.tmp files and see what you come up with.

    In any case clear our your Temporary Internet files and set the disk space allocated to, say 50 Mb and set up IE to empty the tempoary internet files folder when the browser is closed (Tools > Interne Options > Advanced - towards the bottom of the list)

    Clear out other temp files ...

    Start > Run > type in %temp% > Enter. The files shown are safe to delete, but note that a few will be in use and cannot be deleted.

    Do the same for the Windows\Temp folder - same rider.

    Other possibilities are a corrupt pagefile which is not emptying as it should except on reboot and drive problems. Might be worth checking out the drive using the manufacturer's diagnostic software.

    Botom line is malware, but at first sight that seems unlikely.
     
    PeteC,
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  4. 2006/09/22
    David Ryan

    David Ryan Inactive

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    Lots of browsing? Local cache perhaps?
    Run the Disk Cleanup Wizard (it is in Start > All programs > Accessories > System Tools) and delete your temporary files and internet cache (leave any office files though, if you delete them office will ask for the installation disk next time you start one of hte suite members).
    You may as well defrag a few times afterwards, that tends to free up some space if it has been a wile since the last defrag.
     
    David Ryan,
    #3
  5. 2006/09/22
    charlesvar

    charlesvar Inactive Alumni

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    Hello putang1080,

    If you have System Restore enabled, You can cut down on the amount of space that System Restore uses for its restore points.

    The default space allocated is 12% of partition/drive - on a 40 GB partition, that's 4.8 GB's. Once the file reaches that size, its constant, with one or two points being deleted to make room for the latest one.

    Click on My Computer > Properties > System Restore tab and for the Monitored drive > settings. Move the slider left to any disired percentage, I keep it fairly low at 4%.

    Regards - Charles
     
    charlesvar,
    #4
  6. 2006/09/22
    rerato

    rerato Inactive Thread Starter

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    Well, those suggestions are basically what I've first tried. I use Mozilla mostly, and it was already set at a 50 MB cache setting. But I have tried clearing any temp files from browsing in both browsers and still nothing. I also have system restore turned off. Is there a way I could check the if it's the pagefile? Thanks
     
    rerato,
    #5
  7. 2006/09/22
    charlesvar

    charlesvar Inactive Alumni

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    Hi putang1080,

    Turn on hidden files view:

    Viewing Hidden Files
    Go to My Computer >Tools > Folder Options > View tab and make sure that Show hidden files and folders is enabled. Also make sure that the System Files and Folders are showing / visible. Uncheck the Hide protected operating system files option.

    The usual suspects:

    pagefil.sys should be 1.5 the size of physical RAM

    hibersys.fil - the hibernation file if enabled should be the size of RAM

    Regards - Charles
     
    charlesvar,
    #6
  8. 2006/09/22
    rsinfo

    rsinfo SuperGeek Alumni

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    Run chkdsk /f on the drive. There could be some errors on the drive which are eating up the space.

    And 50 MB of browser cache seems a little too big to me - unless you are using dialup. 10 MB or lower should suffice for a broadband connection.
     
    rsinfo,
    #7
  9. 2006/09/22
    charlesvar

    charlesvar Inactive Alumni

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    charlesvar,
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  10. 2006/09/22
    goddez1

    goddez1 Inactive

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    A plain vanilla wrapper approach but an option none the less......
    Do an "All Files and Folders" search using feature options of a "More Advanced Option ">ticking search 1/hidden ,2/system and 3/subfolders and "When Was It Modified ">select todays date only. Note: there are three options in the drop down for preferences for 1/modified 2/created 3/accessed. Try all three. When search is done, sort by size and see if something looks peculiar.
     
    Last edited: 2006/09/22
    goddez1,
    #9
  11. 2006/09/22
    Zander

    Zander Geek Member Alumni

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    You might try a program like DiskData. It will most likely show you where the space is being used. It used to be freeware but it's not anymore. If you prefer the last freeware version, you can get it here. It looks and works pretty much the same as the page I linked to above.
     
    Zander,
    #10
  12. 2006/09/23
    rerato

    rerato Inactive Thread Starter

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    That was some good advice. It turns out a file "trace.log" was over 2 gb in the last few days. I did a quick search and found at least a temporary way of stopping it, but I'm not sure if this file will be created again once I restart my computer. I got the program tracelog.exe and stopped it, but does anybody know if it'll start again if/when I reboot? and if so, how do I stop it? Thanks.
     
    rerato,
    #11
  13. 2006/09/23
    mailman Lifetime Subscription

    mailman Geek Member

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    Last edited: 2006/09/23
    mailman,
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  14. 2006/09/23
    mailman Lifetime Subscription

    mailman Geek Member

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    On my system the "Performance" application shortcut is accesible via Control Panel > Administrative Tools > Performance shortcut

    The Windows XP Performance application is apparently dependent upon the Server service (because I always get "Unable to open the Server service." error in Event Viewer whenever I execute the "Performance" shortcut).

    I do not know what effect disabling the Server service will have on your system, especially if your computer is on a local area network (LAN). I have had my Server service disabled for months/years and my stand-alone (not on a LAN) machine performs the way I want it to. :)


    You can disable the "Server" service via Control Panel > Administrative Tools as follows:

    1. Double-click the "Services" shortcut in Administrative Tools to open the "Services" window.
    2. Scroll down and double-click "Server" to open the "Server Properties (Local Computer)" window.
    3. In the "Startup type:" field, select "Disable ".
    4. Click the "Apply" button.
    5. Click the "OK" button.

    Alternatively, you can disable the "Server" service as follows:

    1. Click Start > Run...
    2. Type services.msc in the "Open:" field.
    3. Click the "OK" button to open the "Services" window.
    4. Scroll down and double-click "Server" to open the "Server Properties (Local Computer)" window.
    5. In the "Startup type:" field, select "Disable ".
    6. Click the "Apply" button.
    7. Click the "OK" button.
     
    Last edited: 2006/09/24
    mailman,
    #13
  15. 2006/09/24
    goddez1

    goddez1 Inactive

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    Didn't really stop to view these in depth but you may have nabbed the little culprit. Others have had similar problem. While the program and reasons for the log vary a bit, I did notice a program "called Bootvis" mentioned a lot. Apparently it's something used to analyze windows startup and optimize it. Ring a bell?

    http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&q=trace.log is huge&sa=N&tab=wg
     
    Last edited: 2006/09/24
    goddez1,
    #14

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