hard drive question

[lazarus]

So I'm trying to get all my mp3s on my wife's laptop, about 40 gigs worth. When I right click on the c: drive and go to properties, it says I have 88gb capacity, 49.1 gb used, and 38.8 free space. I thought holy crap what's taking up all the space on my hard drive?! When I went exploring and I could only find about 10gb worth of stuff. Where is all this other stuff coming from? Is this the "dark matter" that scientists have been looking for? Cause they can search no longer, I found it in my laptop.

 

Now, I got a Lenovo and it does call the hard drive, IBM_PRELOAD (C:) not sure if that matters or not. It's pretty frustrating, and any help would be appreciated. Gracias, amigos.

 

Laz

 

update-

 

so I ran a program that shows you how much space each folder takes up on the hard drive, and it said that my hard drive was only 55gb. What gives? Do I have a 88gb or a 55 gb hard drive?

Edited December 15, 2008 by lazarus

[dwEEziL]

You can use SpaceMonger to see what's using up space on your hdd (there's a 2.x version but it's a pay-for...the 1.4.x one is free) but it sounds like you might have a part of your hdd that isn't formated. Go into Computer Management > Disk Management and check it out.

[anonymo]

If it is a factory set-up Lenovo (which it sounds like it is, if your C is named "pre-load" anything) than most likely there is a hidden partition on your harddrive containing all your back up and restore files.

 

This way you don't need any recovery CDs if Windows decides to go all corrupt on you, you can completely restore (and backup) your Windows environment from the restore partition.

 

If you decide to format, I highly recommend backing up that partition to an external HD in case you ever need it. The restore partition can have your laptop completely recovered in less than 10 minutes and is very easy to use. It helps to have it with you wherever you go but if you really need the space it can format the partition. If you have recovery CDs from Lenovo you can use those to install your OS if you decide to format the entire HD.

[lazarus]

hmmm. yeah i checked and there is indeed 2 partitions on the hd. but it didnt come with any disks or whatnot, so it sounds like what you're talking about anonymo.

 

Well, I guess I'll keep it there, it just seems silly for it to have to take up over half of my harddrive. Oh well. This laptop probably wont last much longer anyway.

 

Thanks for the help guys!

[Preacher]

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