PC TechNumpty Help Thread

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♪♫ Synge ♪♫ Aug 2021 9:07pm, 16 Aug 2021 42,045 posts	0 ♪♫ Synge ♪♫ (Stealing an idea for a thread title from Doogs!) My PC appears to have two disks: a small one (disk 0) which is essentially the C Drive and a large one (disk 1) which is essentially the D Drive. Everything seems to happen on the C drive, which is nearly full, while the D drive, which is much larger, remains unused (except for a bunch of old photos which I manually moved there myself). At first I thought I would be able to make the D Drive smaller and allocate some of the freed up space to the C Drive. But as these are physically separate disks, that will apparently not work. Here's the disk management box, which shows how much space there is just lying idle. My question is: how can I get the PC to start using the D Drive and all those many gigabytes of space instead of painting itself into a corner by going on using the C Drive for everything, programs and data? Presumably, if I do nothing, it will believe that it has run out of disk space any day now ... ?
Diogenes Aug 2021 9:19pm, 16 Aug 2021 62,145 posts	0 Diogenes That’s a reasonable size for the Windows OS. You need to look at what’s actually on there using Windows explorer. Look for the largest files. I suspect that much of the space is taken up with temporary files and profiles, and system dump files (.dmp) from when Windows crashes. You may need to change your explorer settings to show hidden files to see these. Also, check your default save path for files goes to the D drive. It probably defaults to the user profile folder which is on C.
Diogenes Aug 2021 9:21pm, 16 Aug 2021 62,146 posts	0 Diogenes That’s all from memory, I haven’t done this sort of thing for many years.
♪♫ Synge ♪♫ Aug 2021 9:33pm, 16 Aug 2021 42,046 posts	0 ♪♫ Synge ♪♫ Well, at the moment, everything goes to the C Drive. Everything. All the original Windows stuff that I don't understand and all the programs I have added, eg Sage 50, Microsoft Office, iTunes, Norton, Garmin, Steam etc etc and all the data, whether it's data files automatically created by Sage, Garmin, Steam etc or whether it'd files I create in Microsoft Office and save. I get your point about deleting temporary files and download files etc, but I don't think that's very much. There's still a small and ever-reducing amount of space on the C Drive. I think I am capable of setting the file path for saving stuff from Word and Excel into the D Drive, and presumably I'll still be able to access older document files on the C Drive even when I have changed the default location for saving new ones. I could also move a whole load of photos to the D Drive. But the PC will still go on putting everything else on the C Drive until it runs out of space, won't it? For example, any new programs or even upgrades of existing programs?
♪♫ Synge ♪♫ Aug 2021 9:41pm, 16 Aug 2021 42,047 posts	0 ♪♫ Synge ♪♫ Can I simply drag my whole "Documents" folder (6.5 Gb) to the D Drive without causing any problems? And my whole "Pictures" folder (24.8 Gb)? Presumably they are fine to move? But what about "Music" (67.3 Gb, mostly iTunes). Presumably the programs (iTunes, Amazon Music) won't be able to find it if I move it? And can I delete my "Downloads" folder (5.9 Gb) without doing any damage? You will have worked out by now, if you hadn't already, that I am bit out of date with this stuff (who keeps 67.3 Gb of music on their PC these days??!!).
Diogenes Aug 2021 9:46pm, 16 Aug 2021 62,147 posts	0 Diogenes You can choose to install programs to the d drive. You can also uninstall and reinstall existing apps from c to d. It’s generally a good idea to have the c drive for the OS only, have another for program files and another for data. You can repartition the D drive to enable this. I’d definitely look at digging into where exactly all that disk space is used. The OS shouldn’t need that much.
♪♫ Synge ♪♫ Aug 2021 9:50pm, 16 Aug 2021 42,048 posts	0 ♪♫ Synge ♪♫ Oh, yes - when installing a program, it offers an install path, doesn't it! I always hit "OK" and assume it knows best.
StuH Aug 2021 10:22pm, 16 Aug 2021 4,207 posts	0 StuH If your Documents, Downloads, Pictures etc folders are under you profile on C: you can simply move them to D: (r-click>properties>location>move>D:)
larkim Aug 2021 10:18am, 17 Aug 2021 15,246 posts	0 larkim Annoyingly, you can only change the default location for program installations through using the registry, but documents etc can be pretty easily moved. For years I've used the programme "Tree Size Pro" to show me where I'm using space on a disk and then either think about deleting it or moving it. Sometimes folders that you don't expect to be mahoosive turn out to be so. But as above, best advice is:- - don't always choose default location for installations as "C:Program Files" (though probably not a bad idea to set up a folder called something like "Installed programmes" on the D drive so you have a tidy place to put new installs) - use the Windows options to point the "Pictures" "Documents" virtual folders to somewhere on another drive - music / videos / photos should be the biggest users of space so feel free to move those; most apps like iTunes provide options to change the location of where these are saved
um Aug 2021 10:09am, 18 Aug 2021 5,043 posts	0 um Yes, as others have said, all data, pictures/photos, music etc to the D drive. I haven't bothered separating programs, my C drive, co-incidentally (or not) is the same size and cope with Windows & all programs. Downloads - check if there's anything you want, but should be OK to clear. Remember to flush the Recycle bin, otherwise it will all just sit there. Moving music? See discussions.apple.com But your numbers don't seem to add up. If you've got 67GB music, 24GB pictures, 6GB docs and 6GB downloads, some of that must already be on D? When I cleared mine, I found quite a lot was Windows cabs and Windows download files that were only needed during the install/upgrade process. And an automated system file clean up : support.microsoft.com