How do I reduce Vista's "bloat"?

I've got a 3-yr old Dell laptop that I recently upgraded to Vista Business
from WinXP Pro with SP3. It's a spare for the staff and it has been checked
out. The staff member came back to say the HDD was almost full, I checked
and saw that only 7 GB of the 80 GB total was free. So I uninstalled a
bunch of programs and windows components she didn't need or want, ran Disk
Cleanup, Defrag .... I was only able to reclaim 3 GB. Downloaded a trusty
defrag program I use - JK Defrag - and ran it. Only gained another GB.
Rebooted a couple times and re-ran JK Defrag. No gain. Checked the folder
sizes and saw that the WINSXS folder was huge. Checked it via Google and
saw that I can't really get rid of it.

Short of re-formatting the HDD and starting over, what else can I do to
reclaim disk space? I'm guessing that Defrag and JK Defrag aren't doing so
well becuase they have less than 10 GB of "wiggle room" to work with.

--
Mike Webb
Platte River Whooping Crane Maintenance Trust, Inc.
a conservation non-profit (501 (c)(3)) organization
Wood River, NE

When you perform a Disk Cleanup, click on the "More Options" tab
and then click on "Clean up" under "System Restore and Shadow Copies".


"Mike in Nebraska" <> wrote in message news:417093E0-D8BC-4C4D-B171-...
I've got a 3-yr old Dell laptop that I recently upgraded to Vista Business
from WinXP Pro with SP3. It's a spare for the staff and it has been checked
out. The staff member came back to say the HDD was almost full, I checked
and saw that only 7 GB of the 80 GB total was free. So I uninstalled a
bunch of programs and windows components she didn't need or want, ran Disk
Cleanup, Defrag .... I was only able to reclaim 3 GB. Downloaded a trusty
defrag program I use - JK Defrag - and ran it. Only gained another GB.
Rebooted a couple times and re-ran JK Defrag. No gain. Checked the folder
sizes and saw that the WINSXS folder was huge. Checked it via Google and
saw that I can't really get rid of it.

Short of re-formatting the HDD and starting over, what else can I do to
reclaim disk space? I'm guessing that Defrag and JK Defrag aren't doing so
well becuase they have less than 10 GB of "wiggle room" to work with.

--
Mike Webb
Platte River Whooping Crane Maintenance Trust, Inc.
a conservation non-profit (501 (c)(3)) organization
Wood River, NE

Actually, I did do that.

I compared the laptop to my admin PC. I've got lots of apps on it, but
still have 23 GB free out of 80 GB total. It's a Dell desktop, but has the
same OS and also has MS Office 2007 Pro, just like the laptop.

Mike

"Carey Frisch [MVP]" <> wrote in message
news:ED460477-5DEF-469F-8120-...
> When you perform a Disk Cleanup, click on the "More Options" tab
> and then click on "Clean up" under "System Restore and Shadow Copies".
>
>
> "Mike in Nebraska" <> wrote in message
> news:417093E0-D8BC-4C4D-B171-...
> I've got a 3-yr old Dell laptop that I recently upgraded to Vista Business
> from WinXP Pro with SP3. It's a spare for the staff and it has been
> checked
> out. The staff member came back to say the HDD was almost full, I checked
> and saw that only 7 GB of the 80 GB total was free. So I uninstalled a
> bunch of programs and windows components she didn't need or want, ran Disk
> Cleanup, Defrag .... I was only able to reclaim 3 GB. Downloaded a trusty
> defrag program I use - JK Defrag - and ran it. Only gained another GB.
> Rebooted a couple times and re-ran JK Defrag. No gain. Checked the
> folder
> sizes and saw that the WINSXS folder was huge. Checked it via Google and
> saw that I can't really get rid of it.
>
> Short of re-formatting the HDD and starting over, what else can I do to
> reclaim disk space? I'm guessing that Defrag and JK Defrag aren't doing
> so
> well becuase they have less than 10 GB of "wiggle room" to work with.
>
> --
> Mike Webb
> Platte River Whooping Crane Maintenance Trust, Inc.
> a conservation non-profit (501 (c)(3)) organization
> Wood River, NE

It sounds like the drive was getting full before the upgrade. Upgrades from
older versions of Windows often don't work out. I recommend a format and a
clean install.

When you ran Disk Cleanup did you do this?

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/933212

--
Kerry Brown
MS-MVP - Windows Desktop Experience: Systems Administration
http://www.vistahelp.ca/phpBB2/




"Mike in Nebraska" <> wrote in message
news:417093E0-D8BC-4C4D-B171-...
> I've got a 3-yr old Dell laptop that I recently upgraded to Vista Business
> from WinXP Pro with SP3. It's a spare for the staff and it has been
> checked out. The staff member came back to say the HDD was almost full, I
> checked and saw that only 7 GB of the 80 GB total was free. So I
> uninstalled a bunch of programs and windows components she didn't need or
> want, ran Disk Cleanup, Defrag .... I was only able to reclaim 3 GB.
> Downloaded a trusty defrag program I use - JK Defrag - and ran it. Only
> gained another GB. Rebooted a couple times and re-ran JK Defrag. No gain.
> Checked the folder sizes and saw that the WINSXS folder was huge. Checked
> it via Google and saw that I can't really get rid of it.
>
> Short of re-formatting the HDD and starting over, what else can I do to
> reclaim disk space? I'm guessing that Defrag and JK Defrag aren't doing
> so well becuase they have less than 10 GB of "wiggle room" to work with.
>
> --
> Mike Webb
> Platte River Whooping Crane Maintenance Trust, Inc.
> a conservation non-profit (501 (c)(3)) organization
> Wood River, NE

"Mike in Nebraska" <> wrote in message
news:92E75654-D744-429C-9F71-...
> Actually, I did do that.
>
> I compared the laptop to my admin PC. I've got lots of apps on it, but
> still have 23 GB free out of 80 GB total. It's a Dell desktop, but has
> the same OS and also has MS Office 2007 Pro, just like the laptop.
>
> Mike
>
go to http://www.download.com/SpaceMonger/...-10050288.html
and d/l Spacemonger. It's free and will show a graphic of all files and free
space on your HD.
You might also have a bunch of $uninstall$ files from all your hotfixes and
updates....which can be deleted if you don't plan any uninstalls.

Mike in Nebraska wrote:
> I've got a 3-yr old Dell laptop that I recently upgraded to Vista
> Business from WinXP Pro with SP3. It's a spare for the staff and it has
> been checked out. The staff member came back to say the HDD was almost
> full, I checked and saw that only 7 GB of the 80 GB total was free. So
> I uninstalled a bunch of programs and windows components she didn't need
> or want, ran Disk Cleanup, Defrag .... I was only able to reclaim 3 GB.
> Downloaded a trusty defrag program I use - JK Defrag - and ran it. Only
> gained another GB. Rebooted a couple times and re-ran JK Defrag. No
> gain. Checked the folder sizes and saw that the WINSXS folder was
> huge. Checked it via Google and saw that I can't really get rid of it.
>
> Short of re-formatting the HDD and starting over, what else can I do to
> reclaim disk space? I'm guessing that Defrag and JK Defrag aren't doing
> so well becuase they have less than 10 GB of "wiggle room" to work with.
>

Your solution can be found here:

http://www.ubuntu.com/

Alias

Good idea. It's a bit hard to see in one place where the large files/folders
are.


"olfart" <> wrote in message
news:...
>
> "Mike in Nebraska" <> wrote in message
> news:92E75654-D744-429C-9F71-...
>> Actually, I did do that.
>>
>> I compared the laptop to my admin PC. I've got lots of apps on it, but
>> still have 23 GB free out of 80 GB total. It's a Dell desktop, but has
>> the same OS and also has MS Office 2007 Pro, just like the laptop.
>>
>> Mike
>>
> go to http://www.download.com/SpaceMonger/...-10050288.html
> and d/l Spacemonger. It's free and will show a graphic of all files and
> free space on your HD.
> You might also have a bunch of $uninstall$ files from all your hotfixes
> and updates....which can be deleted if you don't plan any uninstalls.
>

I may just have to. I didn't follow the KB, but I will.

Thanks.

"Kerry Brown" <*a*m> wrote in message
news:%...
> It sounds like the drive was getting full before the upgrade. Upgrades
> from older versions of Windows often don't work out. I recommend a format
> and a clean install.
>
> When you ran Disk Cleanup did you do this?
>
> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/933212
>
> --
> Kerry Brown
> MS-MVP - Windows Desktop Experience: Systems Administration
> http://www.vistahelp.ca/phpBB2/
>
>
>
>
> "Mike in Nebraska" <> wrote in message
> news:417093E0-D8BC-4C4D-B171-...
>> I've got a 3-yr old Dell laptop that I recently upgraded to Vista
>> Business from WinXP Pro with SP3. It's a spare for the staff and it has
>> been checked out. The staff member came back to say the HDD was almost
>> full, I checked and saw that only 7 GB of the 80 GB total was free. So I
>> uninstalled a bunch of programs and windows components she didn't need or
>> want, ran Disk Cleanup, Defrag .... I was only able to reclaim 3 GB.
>> Downloaded a trusty defrag program I use - JK Defrag - and ran it. Only
>> gained another GB. Rebooted a couple times and re-ran JK Defrag. No
>> gain. Checked the folder sizes and saw that the WINSXS folder was huge.
>> Checked it via Google and saw that I can't really get rid of it.
>>
>> Short of re-formatting the HDD and starting over, what else can I do to
>> reclaim disk space? I'm guessing that Defrag and JK Defrag aren't doing
>> so well becuase they have less than 10 GB of "wiggle room" to work with.
>>
>> --
>> Mike Webb
>> Platte River Whooping Crane Maintenance Trust, Inc.
>> a conservation non-profit (501 (c)(3)) organization
>> Wood River, NE
>

"Alias" <> wrote in message
news:gmuq0o$i5d$...
> Mike in Nebraska wrote:
>> I've got a 3-yr old Dell laptop that I recently upgraded to Vista
>> Business from WinXP Pro with SP3. It's a spare for the staff and it has
>> been checked out. The staff member came back to say the HDD was almost
>> full, I checked and saw that only 7 GB of the 80 GB total was free. So I
>> uninstalled a bunch of programs and windows components she didn't need or
>> want, ran Disk Cleanup, Defrag .... I was only able to reclaim 3 GB.
>> Downloaded a trusty defrag program I use - JK Defrag - and ran it. Only
>> gained another GB. Rebooted a couple times and re-ran JK Defrag. No
>> gain. Checked the folder sizes and saw that the WINSXS folder was huge.
>> Checked it via Google and saw that I can't really get rid of it.
>>
>> Short of re-formatting the HDD and starting over, what else can I do to
>> reclaim disk space? I'm guessing that Defrag and JK Defrag aren't doing
>> so well becuase they have less than 10 GB of "wiggle room" to work with.
>>
>
> Your solution can be found here:
>
<SHITTY LINK REMOVED>
>
> Alias

Ubuntu is no solution. He has Vista and wants to configure Vista. Since
you offer no help, you shouldn't have replied with an inferior OS that you
think would better serve him. Got news for you - It won't. His MS programs
will no longer work, and he doesn't want to learn some archaic line syntax
crap to try and configure that crappy OS.

Better for to try and get people in poor countries to try that OS because
they can't afford Vista. You are just wasting your time here. Imagine,
Ubuntu is FREE and NOBODY wants it. Ubuntu is on less than ONE PERCENT of
the desktops and their product has been free for years. That should tell
you that people hate the product.

Live with it loser.

An odd thing ... I didn't have "Files from all users on this computer" as an
item to check-mark under Disk Cleanup Options.

"Kerry Brown" <*a*m> wrote in message
news:%...
> It sounds like the drive was getting full before the upgrade. Upgrades
> from older versions of Windows often don't work out. I recommend a format
> and a clean install.
>
> When you ran Disk Cleanup did you do this?
>
> http://support.microsoft.com/kb/933212
>
> --
> Kerry Brown
> MS-MVP - Windows Desktop Experience: Systems Administration
> http://www.vistahelp.ca/phpBB2/
>
>
>
>
> "Mike in Nebraska" <> wrote in message
> news:417093E0-D8BC-4C4D-B171-...
>> I've got a 3-yr old Dell laptop that I recently upgraded to Vista
>> Business from WinXP Pro with SP3. It's a spare for the staff and it has
>> been checked out. The staff member came back to say the HDD was almost
>> full, I checked and saw that only 7 GB of the 80 GB total was free. So I
>> uninstalled a bunch of programs and windows components she didn't need or
>> want, ran Disk Cleanup, Defrag .... I was only able to reclaim 3 GB.
>> Downloaded a trusty defrag program I use - JK Defrag - and ran it. Only
>> gained another GB. Rebooted a couple times and re-ran JK Defrag. No
>> gain. Checked the folder sizes and saw that the WINSXS folder was huge.
>> Checked it via Google and saw that I can't really get rid of it.
>>
>> Short of re-formatting the HDD and starting over, what else can I do to
>> reclaim disk space? I'm guessing that Defrag and JK Defrag aren't doing
>> so well becuase they have less than 10 GB of "wiggle room" to work with.
>>
>> --
>> Mike Webb
>> Platte River Whooping Crane Maintenance Trust, Inc.
>> a conservation non-profit (501 (c)(3)) organization
>> Wood River, NE
>