budgeweiser
New Member
Hey all, to cut a long story short, I have a fairly a common question on how to clean up my computer properly and after finding lots of partially helpful posts on the internet I thought it was time to request a more complete answer from you all.
The basic situation is, like many others before me, that my c: drive is running out of space and my computer is starting to get slow. How can I solve this?
Some extra details that might be helpful: the guy who built my computer (on XP) partitioned the hdd so that I have a 7.8 GB C: drive, a 22.4 GB D: drive and a 44.4 GB E: drive. I also have a 298 GB external G: drive on which I store photos etc (not used as a back-up!). The d,e and g drives all have plenty of space on them and no fragments. The c drive only has 9% free space and has 28% total fragmentation and 48% file fragmentation. And it was worse before (was down to 1% free space a couple weeks ago!).
I have downloaded CCleaner and use that on startup every day. I also regularly still use the windows clean-up utility and defragging. Many of the fragmented files are windows operating files (though often .msp files) and although the system is better now (after uninstalling a lot of programmes and reinstalling them on my d: drive) I can't see how to improve it further and there's still not enough room for the latest service pack and updates for my virus checker.
Is my only option to reformat? And how do I do that? How do I know what files to back up and how do I actually back them up? I think I'll lose a lot of vital stuff if I reformat (display drivers etc) and I'm not sure I have all the necessary install CDs as the computer was built for me. Obviously I'd prefer not to pay money for the solution either!
Thanks for any help you can offer!
The basic situation is, like many others before me, that my c: drive is running out of space and my computer is starting to get slow. How can I solve this?
Some extra details that might be helpful: the guy who built my computer (on XP) partitioned the hdd so that I have a 7.8 GB C: drive, a 22.4 GB D: drive and a 44.4 GB E: drive. I also have a 298 GB external G: drive on which I store photos etc (not used as a back-up!). The d,e and g drives all have plenty of space on them and no fragments. The c drive only has 9% free space and has 28% total fragmentation and 48% file fragmentation. And it was worse before (was down to 1% free space a couple weeks ago!).
I have downloaded CCleaner and use that on startup every day. I also regularly still use the windows clean-up utility and defragging. Many of the fragmented files are windows operating files (though often .msp files) and although the system is better now (after uninstalling a lot of programmes and reinstalling them on my d: drive) I can't see how to improve it further and there's still not enough room for the latest service pack and updates for my virus checker.
Is my only option to reformat? And how do I do that? How do I know what files to back up and how do I actually back them up? I think I'll lose a lot of vital stuff if I reformat (display drivers etc) and I'm not sure I have all the necessary install CDs as the computer was built for me. Obviously I'd prefer not to pay money for the solution either!
Thanks for any help you can offer!