Vista - winsxs

I've just switched over to an intel 30gb SDD drive and space is now at an expensive premium! I worked out ways to reduce the disk space taken up with Vista (vlite etc)......but the size of the winsxs file was something I did not take into account.

It's currently 7.81GB!

I've only got a few programes installed on a recent new build with a slipped SP1 pack. The SP1 setup files have been deleted, turned off system restore, hybernation etc........but the winsxs folder is killing my space.

I've read that it should not be deleted in whole or in part. It can be relocated to another drive, but it is likely to cause problems.

I've also read that it gets bigger at time goes by. Great. Ironically, removing office actually reduced space on the drive as it seems that the winsxs file got bigger than the space taken up by office in the 1st place.

Can I do anything to reduce the file size?

Unfortunately not safely Messing about with the winsxs folder is liable to cause more harm than good. A x64 installation also tends to be larger than a x86 installation.

Is HD space a concern?

Thanks for the reply. I've been reading up on the winsxs folder and I'm even more confused. I've read that the folder size is not actually what is reported as it includes links that get counted as full files (at least I think that was what I read.)

I've also read that unistalling programes removes files from the winsxs folder, but I've tried that and if anything the folder gets bigger.

Bottom line seems to be that no matter what you do to try and free up space, this folder takes it back and can't be controlled (apart from SP remove tools, which only saves a GB or so.)

Does SP2 or Win 7 help solve this "problem". Winsxs takes up over 60% of the total size of the windows folder on my system. This seems just crazy. It smacks of poor program writing based on the theory that hard drives are cheap and getting bigger all of the time, so who cares....but I'm no expert so I don't really know.

All I do know is that I have a folder that is like a cancer that I have no controll over and is making it near impossible to use my intel ssd drive.

Uninstalling apps doesn't necessarily remove all the files initially as they are still marked as usable. They 'should' disappear over time, but it's not exact and unfortunately a lot of useless files are left behind.

SP2 and Seven will unlikely change this. (TBH, I haven't checked 7's winsxs folder yet).

The main reason winsxs exists, is to avoid program incompatabilty issues. ie App 1 requires one version of a .dll file and App 2 requires a different version of that same .dll file. If App 1 requires an older version and App 2 has installed a newer version, then App 1 will no longer work. To avoid this scenario, the winsxs folder keeps a copy of both versions of same .dll file, so both Apps 1&2 will continue to work.

It may seem cancerous, but it's actually beneficial. (But not for limited space ) However, better methods to detect / clean useless files and info would be much appreciated.

Long story short: it's here to stay and there's nothing you can safely do about it (in Vista at least)

Hi audienceofone,

Welcome to the confusion over WinSXS

The actual folder size should be about 700KB not small but not the Hog it is made out to be.

Other things to check when space gets low as in your instance is wasted space. I would reccomend you use something like CCleaner to "tidy" up your drive

CCleaner - Home

Also you may want to check out the other major disk eaters in Vista.

Have a look at these tutorials

System Restore - disk space

System Restore Task - Change Automatic Restore Point Schedule

Thanks for the reply, although it just cost me £500! As this file seems to be able to grow up to 20GB its clear that (even at 10gb) a 32GB is just not going to work with Vista.......the only solution I can see is two 32 gb ssd drives in raid zero.....goodbye to another £500.

I guess most people with huge hard drives (and that included me) will not even be aware of how much space this file takes up. Maybe an extreme example, but this rather annoying folder is currently costing me:

32GB @ £500 = £16 per GB
Current winsxs file size is 10gb.
10gb x £16 = £160.

When I build a raid array I'm going to track how this file develops in size after I start to load up the programes. It will be iintersting (for me anyway) to see how much the folder grows after installing Office for example and how much updates add.

I'm also going to ask CCleaner if they can find a way to add this folder and get rid of the junk......although I really think this is something that MS need to sort out. It might be an easy way out to avoid problems, but I really don't think that it is reasonable that a file can grow to such huge sizes and be mostly full of junk.

@Barmann58

Thanks for the tips, but I've already tried all of them and can't free up enough space. As soon as I free up space the winsxs file grows.

I see you are running win7.....does it have the winsxs file?

Hi Audienceofone,

Unfortunately depending on how many programs you install, Its the way that these programs are written that causes the loss of space, as the programs are written to use old versions of Library files, often because it is easier to do this than to rewrite the code to use the latest versions. There are cases where this is acceptable because of providing backwards compatibility but not always.

WinSXS certainly brings this to our attention but without the existence of this central repository for the links to the libraries used by the various programs there would be even more waste with every program storing it's own copy in it's program directory.

One way that can help is to always install the latest version of the software, but I know this is not always practical. another is to install less used programs onto an external drive rather than the system drive but then that can cause problems with potability

I feel your pain in paying £16 a megabyte a lot to pay but understandable for current SSD drives hopefully this will reduce as they become more available

WinSXS in Windows 7 6956 is just under 4GB on an almost fresh install

Hi barman58.....you mention some interesting things. I had assumed that if I installed say Office 2007 on a seperate hard drive that it might help keep the files off the SSD drive, but it would still write a load of files to the winsxs file.

I was also thinking of not updating software as this would (to my understanding) just add more files to the winsxs file (?)

The process that seemed to cause the winsxs file to suddenly grow beyond believe was a large (237gb) disc copy of data from a normal hhd drive to an external usb drive. My first thought was the temp directory....but then I discovered the winsxs folder!

As I mentioned in my earlier post I'm going to check the growth of the winsxs folder as I progress with a system build tomorrow and I'll post the results.

Hi,

You may want to have a look at this blog entry for reasons for disk space usage and a possible cure for the lost space problems ...

Windows Vista and low disk space - The Problem Solver

Shadow copy is in operation on Vista versions other than Business and Ultimate although you cannot directly use them. this could be an explanation of you sudden space loss following the transfer

As for the adding of programs enlarging the library store (WinSXS) size in theory if the programs you use all use the same set of libraries the then the number of files both on disk and shared via WinSXS should reduce. This of course assumes that if you update an application this will remove existing libraries that are no longer required.

Hope this Helps