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Fri 10 Jun, 2005 07:05 am
My hubby and I bought a new computer about 1 1/2 years ago and spend the extra money to get the biggest so we wouldn't have to end up buying memory or anything before we got a new computer. It is a 111 GB hard drive. Well, the other day I turned on my computer and a little icon popped up saying "MEMORY CRITICALLY LOW". I check the hard drive. 108 GB used up! I thought maybe it was all my digital pictures and music downloads so I got those off the computer. Then I thought maybe it was the games we had on there. So I took all but 5000 MG off. Now we officially have 105 GB used up. What in the hell could take up that much space? A virus? IS there any way we could have actually used up 105 GB of space? Help!!!
Right-click on each of the top-level folders and select properties. That will tell you how much data is in each folder. Just follow the bread crumbs until you find the culprit.
Maybe someone around here with more technical knowledge than me may be able to help you. All I know is that the amount of memory, and the size of your hard drive are two entirely different things.
Perhaps a dumb question, but have you emptied your recycle bin? If not, this could be holding a lot of files and therefore, space.
Yeah, I deleted all the temp files in the local settings folders too for each user, my recycle bin, all temporary internet files, all cookies...you name it I dumped it. I am at a loss as to what the heck is wrong!
Do you have a virus checker from a recognized vendor? Have you run it?
You can use
http://security.symantec.com/sscv6/default.asp?langid=ie&venid=sym&plfid=23&pkj=VSDLCVGZBZTVOGXFSTZ
to check your PC
[edited URL]
Ran McAfee but am told they are not the best virus protection to have.
DrewDad's solution will work just fine. Might help to "show hidden files & folders" too:
In any explorer window: Tools menu -> folder options -> view tab -> hidden files & folders -> show hidden files & foldiers.
Did it already and didn't work.
How much space do your "Windows" directory and "c:\documents and settings" take up respectively?
Dunno...not at home. I will have to check.
One or more of the top-level folders should report a large size. (You can also enable the status bar to see how large an individual folder is; open Windows Explorer, click on View, make sure that Status Bar is checked. Now look at the very bottom of Windows Explorer. It will tell you the number of objects in a folder, the free disk space and over on the right it will tell you how much space is used in the folder.)
Somewhere you should find a file or folder taking up a whole bunch of space.
You can also run chkdsk /f to have Windows check the disk for errors and fix any that it finds.
I ran the Symantics scan and it came up with these things infecting 154 files.
adware.websearch
adware.couponage
adware.webmoxie
I ran the fix but it didn't take them off. I think I need to take it in.
go to majorgeeks.com
download spybot search and destroy.
Did you check the size of the documents and settings and the windows directories? Typically, the Windows directory shouldn't take more than a few gigabytes. The documents and settings directory shouldn't be all that humongous either.
Derevon wrote:How much space do your "Windows" directory and "c:\documents and settings" take up respectively?
Windows is taking up 87 GB! Is that normal??
Do you think that's it?
And if so, what do I do? I have NO clue what I can remove.... Wow!
Found the culprit....
svcpack.log - 91,567,728 KB or roughly 87.3 GB
What is that? I never actually installed the MS SP2 on my computer...it wouldn't take it. So what is that! And why is it there. Help!
shewolfnm wrote:go to majorgeeks.com
download spybot search and destroy.
It found some stuff (ggrrrr....) and removed it but that didn't solve the problem.
If you can track down which folder has large size you can try to eliminate it manually.
Start by checking the size of the TEMP folder in windows. Sometimes it decides to keep all the .tmp files and builds up.
Do you have an always on connection? Another possiblity is someone has hacked your machine and is using it to store all their "warez". I wouldn't panic about that yet. Just eliminate other possibilities first.
I just edited...
I found the offending file but don't know what it is or what to do with it! ACK!
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