unexplained memory loss

G

glenman

New Member
This pc is 4 years old, It has a 20 gig hard drive, I actually started with 18.6 gig, I cannot explain the immediate loss of 1.4 gig.
The total memory used in my add or remove programs list is 3.2 gig, I will allow say 1.5 gig for the XP Home OS, I have a video here using up 0.3 gig, and 6 music tracks about 20 meg ? So a total there of say 5 gig.
The C drive yesterday showed a spare memory of 4 gig. So an unexplained loss of 9.6 gig. And now I have just discovered I cannot get into my C drive folder, a box pops up saying access denied.
Help please guys.
 
First of all it isn't memory being taken up but drive space being filled. Drives are sold in decimal units of measurement for the capacity of magnetic storage on the physical surface of a drive's platters while Windows and other OSs use binary units of measurement being software. A 500gb drive sees 465gb after partitioning and formatting prior to seeing the OS and programs installed.

XP grabs so much visible space for the MS folders like Windows, Program Files, and the DocumentsandSettings folders plus reserves some 2gb of drive space for the paging file used for virtual memory to suppliment the amount of physical memory installed.

Being 4yrs. old and still seeing the original installation of Windows you are now likely seeing a loss of information in the adminstrator account causing Windows to prompt you with access denied errors. Due to age plus wear and tear the hard drive itself is also likely to be now on the way out. The read/write heads being worn are now misreading information stored locally on the drive itself.
 
PC eye - Thank you for that very informative reply. My son is suggesting I reload the original XP Home (without taking anything off), He thinks that will improve the hard drive capacity and my internet speed.
 
If you don't have anything important like family photos or other non replaceable files stored on the drive a complete wipe and fresh start with a fresh copy of Windows would also see a brand new registry to work with. A good install would see a clean drive as well where you know just what is on the drive.

Before deciding on whether you will simply reinstall Windows leaving the current primary intact or start all over fresh there is one free program for cleaning up now useless temp folders and other drive clutter to simply free up a few hundred meg of drive space called by the obvious nick name of "crap cleaner" or simply CCleaner. http://www.ccleaner.com/

If this is on a prebuilt system not a custom case then you would see the primary reformatted and Windows and prepackaged programs going on from a set of recovery disks. Those bring the system back more or less to the condition seen when first buying the pc itself.

You would still want to back things up on removable media you intend to save from the drive prior to doing anything however. If you find the drive itself is starting to go due to wear explaining the errors. Or you may want to consider a larger hard drive even for simply adding in a second drive as a storage device if you intend to keep this system runnng.
 
PC eye - Another informative post from you, thank you very much. My son reloaded Windows, he said as soon as he clicked to install the hard drive would be blitzed. I put on 1.5 gig worth of stuff, Windows OS used up 1.6 gig so 3.1 gig put on. The C drive folder which I can now access is showing 4.75 gig taken up and 13.8 gig free space so I am quite happy with that. Thanks again for your posts.
 
Glad to hear the drive itself wasn't the problem but only needed a good cleaning. After any lengthy period of time the system registry itself sees an accumilation of useless entries from software changes as well as an endless number of temp folders not being used for anything.

Once everything is back on remember to use the defragment tool for the initial installations and on a periodic time frame to keep things running smooth.
 
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