I did a fresh install of vista yesterday, without doing a drive format, and it old me it would put everything from the old windows install in a folder windows.old, which it did, so when it was done i copied back documents and such and deleted the folder. Bringing up the properties on drive C says 70GB has been used, yet selecting everything on the drive and bringing up properties tells me it all takes up around 45GB. I know that vista has some funny filng options, but i dont really know what htey are, and when i deleted windows.old, the folder stayed there, and if i try to delete it again, it tells me it is no longer located there. Can anyone explain to me where my extra 30GB might be getting used?? Thanks

1. Check Recycle bin. If it's empty then.. 2. Disable Vista System Restore, reboot the PC and re-enable it. i_XpUser

Ah, the system restore thing has freed up a good 20GB odd - never realised it was quite so greedy - was it allowing me to take it back to XP or something? Anyway, thanks for your help

Dunno but there's something about Vista SR that even the M$ MVPs have trouble understanding. Read this thread. BTW I learned that Vista SR is more that a repository of SR points - as it is with Windows XP. Vista SR folder includes Shadow copies - and Complete PC Backup if you have this feature - both of which occupies considerable disc space. If you run Disk Cleanup, it will free the huge space stolen from us without our permission. HERE is a How To use (with slides) Vista Disk Cleanup Tool. i_XpUser

Lol... this clears soo much stuff up. I have a 320GB HDD After install of Vista 300GB after office 295GB After flight simulator X 265GB...YAY!! AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+ 1MB L2 per core 4GB Dual Channel ECC 800MHZ 320GB SATA RAID 0 7,200RPM 10/100/1000 Gigabit Networking XFI 7.1 surround sound Dual ATI XGE X1300 512MB VC 600MHZ<br