Vista and Hardrive Space

[Droideka]

I upgraded to vista ( not my choice, I was forced to. We didn't have an XP install disc in the house)
and now I only have 3 Gigabytes left on my hardrive. I only have a handful of programs installed right now, so it isn't a giant game or something eating up all of the space. I can't install any games now because they take up more than 3 gigs on my hardrive, does anybody know what's going on?

[Radical_Pi]

Did you do a clean wipe of the old OS or did you just partition the drive around the old one?

Also, what are the sizes of the folders at the root level (C:\)

[Droideka]

I don't know about how the OS was installed, my step-dad did it. is that an important thing to know?
And the files are pretty normal, I have no idea what is hogging up all of this space.

[attekiller]

If the drive was partitioned, then the HD was split in half; One half has Vista on it, and the other has XP. If that's what he did, then you have a crapload of space devoted to two operating systems, but only one is in use.

[Droideka]

How would I be able to find out if it's partitioned? And would I be able to delete one OS and favor the other?

[aeria.]

If it was split like atte said, then you'll see two hard drives on the my computer page.

[attekiller]

If you do see two drives like Aeria said, you should be able to delete one of the partitions. Unfortunately, I'm not exactly sure how to do this, as I do not have a PC anywhere in the house right now... 

[Droideka]

There's only Drive C:) and D:) with D:) being the backup. So I guess it wasn't partitioned.

[Radical_Pi]

...backup? This is important information to know.

The sure-fire way to know if it is partitioned: (this must be done as an administrator)

Open the start menu, RIGHT click on My Computer and select Manage
Click on Disk Management (under Storage)

If there is only one partition, the thing for Disk 0 should be solid across and not broken in the middle. If possible, a screenshot of the Computer Management window would be nice. (Don't worry, there isn't any dangerous information on there)

[aeria.]

You should have said that earlier about the backup HD. Just backup and reformat the HD.

It may seem harsh at first, but it's a lot better at the end now that you can start again from a clean copy of Windows.
Also learning how to burn ISO files would help you...

[Droideka]

[Radical_Pi]

Hmm, try assigning a drive letter to the 3 gig partition (right click on the box and click "Drive letter and paths"). Also, what is taking up all of the space on that drive that is shown as C?

If that doesn't work, I have one last idea to try, then you're on your own