Vista shows half of actual free disk space

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vishalrao

vishalrao

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I have a problem. My C: on Vista shows double the actual usage. Its a 75gb partition showing 35gb free when I only have about 20gb worth of data on it.I already tried chkdsk which reported and fixed some errors but still no go.It was earlier a 140gb partition which I shrunk to 75gb, then created a second windows partition of 55gb, and the remaining I formatted for my Ubuntu installation...Any tips to fix the problem and recover the lost space?
 
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Disk Cleanupclean up all restore points but the recent one... also clean up all the extra junk... 😛thats the name of an application 😉disable hibernation if u do not use it... that would save u as much space as u have ram on ur machine.u can also try ccleaner application. 😛
 
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no i think you missed the key point, i used jdiskreport and it shows i have 20gb worth of files, same shown by selecting C:\ and looking at the size in Vista... just 20gb, but used space shows 40gb, remaining only 35gb, when it should show 55gb left...some partition table or file table corruption i guess... nothing to do with cleaning up restore points or hibernation file etc...i guess i was asking for any free tool like norton disk doctor to do a disk check, any suggestions?
 
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running any of those tools under vista would be = inviting troubles.what i am suggesting is that maybe vista hides these files from tools like jdiskreport or explorer...here vista shows 55 GB consumed with everything selected in C: capacity: 136 GBfree space: 56.2 GBwhat happens when i turn on visibility for system files... checking...Consumed space: 62.3 GB...adding them gives me 118.5 GB... 136-118.5 = 17.5 GB (missing space) !!!!!! 😀
 
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Since you already have ubuntu installed can u use ntfs-3g on it to see what size it is reporting ? Try Acronis disk director and make sure to run it from bootable cd instead of running it from vista .
 

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The linux idea is good. What about chkdsk? What size does it report? It tells you what space is used by log files, system files etc. etc. The main culprit is the System Volume Information folder which is locked, always shows 0 bytes as size and has all the ntfs info hidden inside it.
 
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cool, will try ntfs-3g to see how much usage it reports, and will also try turning off system restore...
 
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i'm thinking of not installing windows on my next desktop pc, only ubuntu, and let my mom use that to see the results of a basic user's day-to-day, well, usage... only my tablet will have the existing vista+ubuntu dual boot...
 
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doh, it's system restores saved checkpoints which are taking 20gb but showing up as zero in vista. so i can turn off system restore and/or delete unwanted save points.i dont know why i didnt think of it before myself, but looking thru ubuntu's ntfs-3g showed me the "missing" free space being used up, thanks folks!
 
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