How do I clean my hard drive and free up space?

Answer 1

I have mine done every six months at a computer repair shop. I make backups of all my important files on to a DVD and then take it to the shop. They erase everything, give the PC a health check and reinstall everything for me. It's costs about £30.

OK, so I could do it myself, but they know what they're doing much better than I do and they add all the latest drivers and essential add-ons and tweak it for optimal performance. And there's a 30 day guarantee on the work too.

Last time I had more powerful fans installed and that cost just £10 extra. I also asked them to get me a better virus checker than the one I had and made it clear that I was willing to pay whatever it cost. They installed a free one that is really good and easy to use, so that reduced my overall bill considerably.

It's a peace of mind thing really, and as I don't have any data on my PC that I'm worried about getting into the wrong hands, I have no worries.

Answer 2

Windows operating system locate the command prompt and go there to do the following:
Create a Recovery file of system and date it today.

Then begin by;
delete the 'Temp' folders..they have hidden subfolders so you need to set the attributes in order to bypass this. For each subfolder delete all cookies and rubbish left behnd after install-uninstalled programs. Do a 'dir' command to check your progress. Make sure the 'Temp' file is empty.

goto c:\windows\prefetch and delete everything in there..no exceptions

goto c:\windows folder and delete all the '$' files that have been installed by updates. They can all be succesfully deleted and just take up disk space.

Locate the Internet Temporary Files..Check to see how high the saving level is..some have it set at 30 days..but that stores faaaar tooo much data..though it slows down the system overal. Keep this to a minimum..suggest 2 or 5 at most.

Delete all 'cookies' all those you don't need.

Locate the windows directory and go through the folders you know and those you don't need. Check this once a week at least. Some programs will install under XP as NT and older systems where there is no check of systems weight.

Check to see that system files have not changed since last booting. Things like .ini files or .bat are important items.


Check for 'Hidden Directories' all over the disk...do this at the command prompt:

dir *.* /ah wil show these hidden directories

Check the 'dir' command for all parameters & how to do this.

If you are satisfied..logoff and logon as administrator in safe mode. Then do a defragmentation of the disk you've just cleaned up.

Logoff and logon again as your own id.

Run a program like registry mechanic or crap cleaner and get rid of the junk you missed.

Hope this helped.

Answer 3

There isn't much information in your question. A few things that would help the people answering are:

1. What size is the drive?
2. Do you have more than one?
3. How much space is left?
4. What operating system are you using?

The obvious answer is to delete files. Maybe that isn't an option for you because the drive is packed to the walls with important stuff. To make it easier, you could search an entire drive with the string "*", the wildcard symbol. That will bring up a list of every file you have stored. Then you can arrange the list by size and concentrate on only the largest files, where your scrutiny matters most.

The other option? Buy a second one. Storage space is cheap these days. You can get good drives below $0.25/gigabyte.

Answer 4

Try using defragmentation. This takes out all the little spaces where bits of stuff have been deleted and the gap isn't big enough for other things you want to save. It's a bit like re-organising a cupboard. In the accessories bit of the start up, it takes a few minutes but is worth it. It usually helps things run more smoothly too.

Answer 5

I recently found an EXCELLENT program for cleaning up wasted space, it was referred to me by a friend. It cleans up temporary files from almost every program that can be detected (firefox, internet explorer, etc.)

http://filehippo.com/download_ccleaner/

I never knew, but after I ran this program it cleared up a good wasted 3 gigs of space on my computer! I was very impressed.

And no, I do not work for the site, just very satisfied =)

Another thing that can help is to clear up some unwanted programs you may have accidentally installed.

Start > Control Panel > Add/Remove Programs.

Scroll through the list and get rid of any programs you see that are just wasted. For me it's normally search toolbars, accidental downloads of gambling programs or old games that I never play anymore.

This is all assuming you own a PC.

Another more drastic plan is to do a complete re-format of your computer. If you're worried about major trojans and viruses, this is often your best bet. If you just want to clear up some space for some new music, temporary files and old programs are the best route.

Answer 6

if you have any programs on your pc that you no longer use, then remove them by going into your control panel, select add / remove programs, select from the index the programs you dont want and uninstall them, that would free alot of space, and also click on my computer on the desktop screen, right click on c:/ select disk cleanup and select your temp internet files, and then select disk defrag, all these things will help you, i have an 80g c:/ drive, and it's not even a quarter full, simply because i have another spare storage drive which keeps all my saved files and songs away from the main c:/ drive which is only used for the programs and appliications

Answer 7

go to my computer->C: (or whatever your hard drive letter is)
-> program files. Delete anything here you a)dont use b)dont need anymore c)dont know what it is (before you delete these, look in the folder and see what is inside. If you don't know what the things inside are, google them and find out what they are. If they are important KEEP THEM! if they are just files for other programs that you dont need, delete them).

then delete all menus that are now empty/dont work from the start->all programs list after you have deleted programs that you dont need from program files list.

Delete all icons on your desktop. BE RUTHLESS! if you can get it from the start menu, or toolbar then you don't need an icon for it

Next, go to start-> all programs -> accecsories -> system tools ->disk cleanup. run this and let it do it's thing

Next do a disk defragmentation. go to start-> all programs -> system tools -> disk defragmenter select your hard drive and click defragment. This will group files and all fragmented files will be defragmented, making them easier for your computer to access and more compact

finally, run a system scan with your anti virus and anti spyware. This will make sure that any files which dont want to be there, such as cookies, trackers or viruses will be deleted, removeing another file or two

Answer 8

You could start by running the disk defragmentation tool if you are running windows. There are also options to clean old files from your system. But I would consider buying a dedicated defrag tool.

Answer 9

Back up all music, video's, documents etc to cd. Make two copies of each disk and archive one copy.

Sort out all your email into folders with dates within your inbox. Then export all old stuff. If you use MS Outlook, create Outlook data files, but don't let them get bigger than 50MB.
Then move them to cd/dvd.

Then follow the advice from above.

Answer 10

you need external USB hard drive or 2gb USB storage device,
plus you can us various different cards like SD but you would need a card reader,etc. You can also back up files what you don`t use onto CD, to clear space on your main hard drive
( local : C) and clear Cache Files and do regular Defragment.