Here's a problem that I haven't been able to resolve for the last two months. I've researched this problem on this forum and nothing been able to solve it yet. My work computer's c-drive keeps filling up to capacity. I have a 235 GB hard drive with very few programs loaded onto it and almost no picture or video files taking up space. The computer is hooked up to a network here where I work, but nobody else has this problem. Even if I'm able to free up several GB's of space, the c-drive will fill up in just a couple of days. I think I might have a virus. These are the measures I've tried to correct this issue: Ran Disk Cleanup which freed up about 2 GB's initially. After a couple of days, the c-drive filled back up again. Subsequently, running Disk Cleanup only free's up a few MB's now. Ran MalewareBytes, Eset online scanner, and Super-AntiSpyware programs to try to identify a virus, but neither of them can find anything other than cookies. I've also run these programs in Safe Mode. My Microsoft Security Essentials program had been removed, and I can't get it to re-install. I even tried several work-arounds listed on this forum to install it, but I still get error messages when installing. Tried the "Fix It" function Tried System Restore but apparently that's been disabled too since there are no restore points to be found Disabled the Hibernate function to free up several GB's, but the computer quickly filled-up within a couple of days. Disabled the Backup function. Deleted temp files from my user profile I also run into problems trying to install the security updates from the Windows Update function. I haven't been able to get the security updates to install for a couple of months now. Anything thing I do that free's up space will only work temporarily. The c-drive will continue to fill up in a matter of minutes or hours even if I'm away from my computer during that time. The strangest part is that if I right-click on the c-drive in My Computer, it will show that the 232 GB hard-drive is nearly or completely full (0 bytes). If I open the c-drive, select all the files and folders in it and right-click, it only shows about 51 GB's of storage space used. This does affect my computer greatly when trying to save or print even small files that only take up a few KB's. Is there any other fix that I haven't tried yet? I ran the WinDirStat utility but that doesn't show me anything other than the 51 GB's taking up storage space. Also, my hard-drive is not partitioned.

@jsdrgrandma Your post is a good example of why people SHOULD start their own question instead of adding on to a thread started several years ago and SHOULD NOT go to chain stores, electronics stores, office supply stores, and the like for computer help. In your case, we have no idea what "it" might be ... and perhaps you don't either, if all that you were told by the Geek Squad was "it was some sort of glitch." If you read through the original post and 26 replies (and counting) in this thread, you'll notice that there are different problems that cause a hard drive to fill up. TreeSize Free is a good tool for diagnosing such problems, but after the problem is diagnosed, there are going to be different ways of proceeding depending on what was found. Your question doesn't provide enough information to send you any more help. Frankly, it's difficult to see how you might be having a problem similar to those mentioned in the thread because shutting down and restarting the computer should not delete files from your hard drive and thus would not alleviate a problem of your hard drive filling up, even temporarily. Please read: How to begin your own, new thread about your computer & your problem How to ask a question

I was told by the Geek Squad it was some sort of glitch, and to shutdown and restart, and that definitely works, except it happens again, usually once a day!! I will look into the tree size, I am not computer savvy at all so any more info please send it my way!! Thanks so much

I came here to try and figure out a similar issue: free space getting eaten up by ... something. It was driving me nuts. I have a similar size SSD, with not even half of it in use; but I still kept running out of space. Thanks to the hint about TreeSize Free I found what's going on. WinDirStat, which I installed several weeks ago to solve this puzzle, did not help one bit. But with TreeSize I was able to pinpoint the culprit right away: a totally out of control Windows.edb file! As I'm writing this it's 128.8 GB big... Once I Googled that (sorry Bing!) I found that this is a known issue; and that there's a fix for it. It should be covered in KB2836988, which I just tried downloading but it failed - zero bytes left on my drive! I'll try a thumb drive. Important lesson learned (again): when the experts tell you to use program X, don't use program Y.

Thank you very much, your answer helped me. Treesize tool helped me to figure out the problem, after that I could solve it easily

Check out this article from the Caged Rat: http://www.cagedrat.com/microsoft-windows/microsoft-windows-updates-cab-files-filling-up-hard-drive/ There some good info in there about cleaning up CAB files from old Windows updates.

C-drive keeps filling up

Anonymous

Here's a problem that I haven't been able to resolve for the last two months. I've researched this problem on this forum and nothing been able to solve it yet. My work computer's c-drive keeps filling up to capacity. I have a 235 GB hard drive with very few programs loaded onto it and almost no picture or video files taking up space. The computer is hooked up to a network here where I work, but nobody else has this problem. Even if I'm able to free up several GB's of space, the c-drive will fill up in just a couple of days. I think I might have a virus. These are the measures I've tried to correct this issue:

Ran Disk Cleanup which freed up about 2 GB's initially. After a couple of days, the c-drive filled back up again. Subsequently, running Disk Cleanup only free's up a few MB's now.
Ran MalewareBytes, Eset online scanner, and Super-AntiSpyware programs to try to identify a virus, but neither of them can find anything other than cookies. I've also run these programs in Safe Mode.
My Microsoft Security Essentials program had been removed, and I can't get it to re-install. I even tried several work-arounds listed on this forum to install it, but I still get error messages when installing.
Tried the "Fix It" function
Tried System Restore but apparently that's been disabled too since there are no restore points to be found
Disabled the Hibernate function to free up several GB's, but the computer quickly filled-up within a couple of days.
Disabled the Backup function.
Deleted temp files from my user profile
I also run into problems trying to install the security updates from the Windows Update function. I haven't been able to get the security updates to install for a couple of months now.

Anything thing I do that free's up space will only work temporarily. The c-drive will continue to fill up in a matter of minutes or hours even if I'm away from my computer during that time.

The strangest part is that if I right-click on the c-drive in My Computer, it will show that the 232 GB hard-drive is nearly or completely full (0 bytes). If I open the c-drive, select all the files and folders in it and right-click, it only shows about 51 GB's of storage space used. This does affect my computer greatly when trying to save or print even small files that only take up a few KB's. Is there any other fix that I haven't tried yet?

I ran the WinDirStat utility but that doesn't show me anything other than the 51 GB's taking up storage space. Also, my hard-drive is not partitioned.

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

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51 answers

LemP 74,985 Reputation points Volunteer Moderator

2017-11-19T17:07:44+00:00

@jsdrgrandma

Your post is a good example of why people SHOULD start their own question instead of adding on to a thread started several years ago and SHOULD NOT go to chain stores, electronics stores, office supply stores, and the like for computer help.

In your case, we have no idea what "it" might be ... and perhaps you don't either, if all that you were told by the Geek Squad was "it was some sort of glitch."

If you read through the original post and 26 replies (and counting) in this thread, you'll notice that there are different problems that cause a hard drive to fill up. TreeSize Free is a good tool for diagnosing such problems, but after the problem is diagnosed, there are going to be different ways of proceeding depending on what was found.

Your question doesn't provide enough information to send you any more help. Frankly, it's difficult to see how you might be having a problem similar to those mentioned in the thread because shutting down and restarting the computer should not delete files from your hard drive and thus would not alleviate a problem of your hard drive filling up, even temporarily.

Please read:

How to begin your own, new thread about your computer & your problem

How to ask a question
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Anonymous

2017-11-19T16:40:22+00:00

I was told by the Geek Squad it was some sort of glitch, and to shutdown and restart, and that definitely works, except it happens again, usually once a day!! I will look into the tree size, I am not computer savvy at all so any more info please send it my way!! Thanks so much
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Anonymous

2017-11-19T04:50:25+00:00

I came here to try and figure out a similar issue: free space getting eaten up by ... something. It was driving me nuts. I have a similar size SSD, with not even half of it in use; but I still kept running out of space.

Thanks to the hint about TreeSize Free I found what's going on. WinDirStat, which I installed several weeks ago to solve this puzzle, did not help one bit.

But with TreeSize I was able to pinpoint the culprit right away: a totally out of control Windows.edb file! As I'm writing this it's 128.8 GB big...

Once I Googled that (sorry Bing!) I found that this is a known issue; and that there's a fix for it. It should be covered in KB2836988, which I just tried downloading but it failed - zero bytes left on my drive! I'll try a thumb drive.

Important lesson learned (again): when the experts tell you to use program X, don't use program Y.
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Anonymous

2017-11-05T14:11:17+00:00

Thank you very much, your answer helped me.

Treesize tool helped me to figure out the problem, after that I could solve it easily
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Anonymous

2016-03-24T05:10:48+00:00

Check out this article from the Caged Rat: http://www.cagedrat.com/microsoft-windows/microsoft-windows-updates-cab-files-filling-up-hard-drive/

There some good info in there about cleaning up CAB files from old Windows updates.
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