is it safe to compress drive to save space?

Question

in the drive properties were it says "compress files to save space" is this safe to do, and with 11gb left on my c drive how much will i gain, and how long does it take to do?
thanks

Answer 1

I would not recommend compressing the entire drive, especially not the operating system (c:\windows) and program files.

Maybe compress your documents, with a modern computer you should not really notice the difference.

But still, with HD prices falling and falling it is more efficient to just buy a bigger HD. Especially considering that next week/month you will run out of space again.

Answer 2

With Windows 2000 and Windows XP it works well. This only works if you are using the NTFS file system. If you are using FAT32, you will need to convert to NTFS first.

Compressing an NTFS drive is not like compressing the old Windows 9x drives. It doesn't have the problems that the old doublespace had.

There is no change in performance. It will save you about 25%. This varies depending on the type of files you store on your hard drive. Some files compress better than others.

You can also compress individual files or folders if you don't want to compress the whole drive.

I suggest doing a defrag after compressing the drive.

Answer 3

it is save at a cost of speed, cmpressing files takes up processor performance... as to how much you will gain will depend on the content on your computer. multimedia content is usually quite compressed already so more than likely it will compress your programs... thus making them slower to open. there will also be an overhead on your PC's RAM (Memory). Buy a new hard drive if you can. However 11GB is still quite alot.

Answer 4

This is a safe link where you can download winrar for free here http://bit.ly/1v2nWkq

You can use winrar to unzip zip files (or to open compressed folder). 7zip or winzip are other softwares you can use for the same purpose but winrar is by far the best one. All these programs work in a very similar way: you just have to right click the file to zip or unzip any folders or files.

If you don't want a trial version don't worry. The trial period of winrar never ends so you can use it for free with no limitations.

With WINRAR you will be able to open all the type of compressed folder like file .zip, .rar, .7z, .7zip .iso, .tar, .jar etc... that's the main reason why I recommend it.

Answer 5

I have have done this before without any difficulties. However, it may be better, if you have time to go through and manually free-up space.

I seem to remember, just before compression starts the system will tell you how much 'space' you will have after compression.

Depending on the applications you use, using compression may affect performance, as indeed having a disk so full that data cannot be written to contiguous space. So I would advise against using compression.

Hope this helps.

Answer 6

You can do a test to find out how much space you will regain.
It is safe to do it but it may increase the seek time and therefor start time of some of the programs on your machine.
You would be better to get another hard drive and use that for storage

Answer 7

It is safe to compress. Can't say how much you'll get without knowing your drive size. Also, Compressed data is not accessed as fast as uncompressed and therefore can slow down you transfer rate. I suggest you either backup to disc and delete or add another hard drive.
noodge

Answer 8

Hi there,
Check here http://j.mp/1p3PyRp if you want to get Winrar for free
Winrar is the best way to open compressed files, folders or documents. you can unzip files zip, rar, tar, jar, 7z, iso, ect...
Best of luck!

Answer 9

it is safe, but your drive will slow down like you never believed it. maybe buy yourself another hard drive... it is better than compressing it..