10 Easy Ways to Increase Disk Space In Windows 7

Hard disk space, no matter how much you have, is never enough. Specially, when you feel like storing multimedia content on your PC, the free space starts getting low and low.  Today, we’ll be talking about tips and trick that show how to save and increase hard disk space in windows 7 based system. Below are the 10 killer tips that you can use to free up your hard disk space if you are running windows 7.

 1. Disk Clean up

Disk Clean up is a built in tool in windows 7 (and earlier version of Windows) that allows you to delete files that are not needed. It is the easiest way to increase disk space. It cleans up your disk by deleting temporary files that are piled up over a period of time. These files include:

• Temporary Internet files
• Recycle Bin
• Downloaded Program files
• Windows temporary files

You can start Disk Cleanup, by doing the following:

• Click Start
• Type “Disk Cleanup” (without quotes)
• Select the drive you want to clean. Then click “OK”
• Select your Desired Files
• Click OK
• System will ask to delete files. Click Delete files

2. Remove Unwanted Programs

What good is an operating system alone? You need different software packages to complete your day to day work. If there are some programs installed on your machine that are not required any more, it is recommended that you un-install those programs to save disk space. Below is the method to un-install unused programs:

• Click Start
• Type “Uninstall a Program“
• Hit Enter
• Now select the program you want to un-install and hit Uninstall
• Remove Unwanted Windows Features

3. Remove Built-in Programs

Your Windows 7 OS is also packed with a number of software programs. Most often, these programs are not required and it is recommended that you uninstall these programs. To do so, do the following:

• Click Start
• Type “Uninstall a Program“
• Hit Enter
• Click “Turn Windows features on or off“
• Now un-check the feature you want to disable and hit OK

4. Disable Page File

Disabling Page File is not recommended so if you are not in dire needs of free disk space do not follow this. Windows utilizes a hard disk space when it gets low on memory and reserves it as Page File. If you are in dire need of hard disk space then you can disable this feature. In order to disable the page file:

• Click Start
• Type “Advance System Setting” (without quotes)
• Hit Enter
• Advance System Settings Dialogue Box will appear, Click Settings under Performance
• In the Performance Options Dialogue box, click the Advanced tab and then click the Change button under the Virtual Memory option.
• Now in the Virtual Memory dialogue box, un-check the Automatically manage paging file size for all drives option, and choose No Page option.

Again, I should remind you that this is not a recommended step. Only do it if you are in dire need of disk space.

5. Disable System Restore

System restore is a feature of Windows 7 that keeps image of your programs and use it to restore your system to a previous state in case of system malfunction. It is ok to disable system restore on drives other than C: drive. Though it won’t have an effect on the size of C drive, it will release some space in other drive. If you are in dire need of space in C drive too, then disable System Restore on All Drives. To do so:

• Right Click Computer Icon on Desktop or Start Menu
• Click Properties
• Click System Protection
• Select the drive on which you want to disable System Restore and Click Configure
• Select Turn off system protection from appearing dialogue box and Click OK.

6. Remove All But the Most Recent Restore Point

Windows 7 keeps a record of Restore Points in the disk in case of emergency to retrieve your settings and data back. These restore points are created at particular time intervals as well as when you install some software such as device drivers. Later, when you plan to restore your system to a different state, these restore points help you get to a stable state. It is better to keep only the last restore point and delete all the restore points before that to save disk space.

• Click Start
• Type “Disk Cleanup” (without quotes)
• Select the drive you want to clean. Then click “OK”
• Click on “Cleanup System Files” button.
• Select the drive in which you have installed Windows. Then click “OK”
• Click on “More Options” tab.
• In the “System Restore and Shadow Copies” section, click on “Clean up…” button.
• Click on “Delete” button.
• Click “OK”.
• Windows will now ask for confirmation to delete files. Click “Delete Files”.

You are done. Now only the latest restore point will be saved in your PC. All the old System Restore points will be deleted.

7. Disable Hibernate

Hibernate is a feature of Windows 7 that shuts down your system but keeps track of all the programs and data loaded in the RAM. The next time you start your system, you get all your open programs and files back the same way. Hibernate is a good feature and is very helpful but unfortunately it takes 2-8 GB of precious disk space. If you don’t use hibernate feature then it is recommended that you disable hibernate. To disable hibernate do the following:

• Click Start
• Type “cmd” (without quotes)
• A list of files will appear, Right Click cmd and select Run as administrator
• In the command prompt type “powercfg -h off” (without quotes) and hit enter.
• You can get your wasted space back.

 8. Delete %TEMP% Files

Although Disk Clean up is suppose to clean up TEMP folder, sometimes it just doesn’t work. To overcome this, you can delete these files yourself. The method is easy, just do the following:

• Click Start
• Type %TEMP%
• Hit Enter
• A folder will appear, select all files by pressing CTRL + A
• Now hit the delete button. All the temp files will be deleted.
• To ignore Recycle Bin press SHIFT + DEL

You might get a warning that a file cannot be deleted. It is because some programs are using those file. You should simply ignore those file and continue with the deletion.

 9. NTFS Compression

Windows 7 comes equipped with a tool called NTFS Compression that compresses data in a hard disk thus freeing up disk space. This is an effective option and can save a lot of disk space. To do so, just do the following:

• Just right click a folder, hit Properties
• Click the Advanced Button
• Select Compress
• Click OK

10. Cookies and Caches

Cookies are a technique widely used on the web. Many sites retain visitor information using cookies on user’s browser. After a long use, these cookies pile up to take a large amount of disk space. Cookies increase the website performance but in most cases these are useless and should be deleted to avoid becoming a victim of some hacker. Similarly, Caches are also maintained by web browsers to increase website performance. You can get rid of both of these to get some disk space back. To do so:

• Click Start
• Type “inetcpl.cpl” (without quotes) in the Start Search box
• Press ENTER
• On the General tab, click Delete under Browsing History in the Internet Properties dialog box.
• In the Delete Browsing History dialog box, un-check all check boxes and check only Cookies
• Click Delete

We hope you like our tips and tricks to free up hard disk space in windows 7. If you want more, keep coming. Do let us know about these tips and how did they work out for you, the comments section is all yours.