4 GB of disk space appeared overnight!

[mikeha.ca]

I left my PC on overnight last night, and when I checked it this
morning, I noticed that 4 GB of disk space was free. When I left it
last night, only about 800 MB were available on the drive. Now it's
almost 5 GB. I have a 100 GB hard drive.
Does anyone know what can cause this to happen? Is there some
autonmated process that XP does to clean up the drive automatically? I
don't think I have any of that stuff turned on, but maybe? All my
files still seem to be on the drive, so I don't think I've lost any
data.

 

[jeffyablon]

I left my PC on overnight last night, and when I checked it this
morning, I noticed that 4 GB of disk space was free. When I left it
last night, only about 800 MB were available on the drive. Now it's
almost 5 GB. I have a 100 GB hard drive.
Does anyone know what can cause this to happen? Is there some
autonmated process that XP does to clean up the drive automatically? I
don't think I have any of that stuff turned on, but maybe? All my
files still seem to be on the drive, so I don't think I've lost any
data.

The key is your statement that you "left it on overnight". Undoubtedly,
some automated process ran while you were asleep (disk clean-up, disk
defragmentation . . . maybe both), and as a result you now have not
only more space but probably also a safer, slightly faster computer.
Didn't even know you had those things turned on, did you?!?

 

[mikeha.ca]

No, I didn't think I had any of that stuff turned on, but then again I
haven't done much configuration to this computer since getting it from
Dell. It's a new computer.
I did notice a setupact.log file that had this mornings date/time
stamp on it, and it did something to rebuild the free space on the
drive and looks like it also rebuilt the page file on my C: drive. So
it must be some XP automated process that runs periodically to clean
things up. Also I noticed the windows update log file got updated as
well.

 

[mikeha.ca]

No, I didn't think I had any of that stuff turned on, but then again I
haven't done much configuration to this computer since getting it from
Dell. It's a new computer.
I did notice a setupact.log file that had this mornings date/time
stamp on it, and it did something to rebuild the free space on the
drive and looks like it also rebuilt the page file on my C: drive. So
it must be some XP automated process that runs periodically to clean
things up. Also I noticed the windows update log file got updated as
well.

 

[R. McCarty]

Cleanup Wizard runs on a fixed schedule. It keeps a last run key date
in the Registry. Also, Dell has it's own System update/maintenance type
of application that runs. Might want to take a look at Scheduler and in
the Startups to see what background services are loaded. I believe if
check Add/Remove programs you'll see at least 2 Dell Support type of
applications are installed.

 

[kicken18]

I didnt think you could have windows defrag on a scedual, i know you can
have it start up but not start defragging unless you have a mouse macro or
new defrag softwear

 

[no_one]

fwiw, defragging does not gain space; it merely organizes what you have. to
gain space you must remove data.

 

[Steve N.]

I left my PC on overnight last night, and when I checked it this
morning, I noticed that 4 GB of disk space was free. When I left it
last night, only about 800 MB were available on the drive. Now it's
almost 5 GB. I have a 100 GB hard drive.
Does anyone know what can cause this to happen? Is there some
autonmated process that XP does to clean up the drive automatically? I
don't think I have any of that stuff turned on, but maybe? All my
files still seem to be on the drive, so I don't think I've lost any
data.

Compression.

Steve

 

[Winux P]

Do you sleep walk?

- Winux P

 

[Lil' Dave]

If you ran a memory intensive program or programs that substantially ate
into swapfile use, it highly possible that the space was regained by
swapfile resize after lack of use.

Consider a larger capacity hard drive, its borderline now.