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gman901

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Sep 1, 2007
607
14
Houston, TX
I currently run Windows 7 Home edition on my Bootcamp partition @ 20 GB in total size so I can reserve most of my space to the Mac side. The only reason I use Windows 7 is for Steam, which I currentlly run using an external hard drive so no space is taken up on my Windows partition. I also have Parallels 6.0 running on my Air and use it for work related stuff that requires Windows. My Bootcamp partition has 2.1 GB remaining (and this is without updating to Service Pack 1). Everything runs fine and is very fast on both partitions; however I am a little worried that I may fill up my drive space on Windows due to all of the updates that keep happening. How close can I get to my 20 GB capacity can I get without causing Windows to slow down and what can I do to free up more space (considering that I have no data or personal applications running on Windows 7). One more thing - I already applied the remove Hibernation trick which helped me free up another 2 GBs of space. Thanks!
 
20 GB should be enough for your purposes. I am hovering around 14 GB for Windows 7. In addition to adjusting virtual memory, try to look around for anything you don't need such as in TEMP locations. In the old days, I use to prune my Windows 3.1 directory down to around 8 Mb by deleting help files and other files. Those days the 8 Mb was today's 8 GB. I have a virtual session that boots up Windows 3.1 in about a second. It is limited to only 32 MB of memory.

It makes sense to install Steam on an external drive for bootcamp. That is what I do with my iMac but I placed it on a Firewire mini drive for performance.
 
20 GB should be enough for your purposes. I am hovering around 14 GB for Windows 7. In addition to adjusting virtual memory, try to look around for anything you don't need such as in TEMP locations. In the old days, I use to prune my Windows 3.1 directory down to around 8 Mb by deleting help files and other files. Those days the 8 Mb was today's 8 GB. I have a virtual session that boots up Windows 3.1 in about a second. It is limited to only 32 MB of memory.

It makes sense to install Steam on an external drive for bootcamp. That is what I do with my iMac but I placed it on a Firewire mini drive for performance.

Thanks! I wondered about deleting some of those files. Can I also delete the built in games and Windows Media application?
 
So is that option available under remove programs? I can't tell right now because I am away from my Air.
 
So is that option available under remove programs? I can't tell right now because I am away from my Air.

I could have sworn you can uninstall windows features but I just looked and it isn't there. Uninstalling a program was different than uninstalling parts of your Windows 7 installation. I am not sure but I think it was changed to "Turn Windows features on or off" which doesn't look like it will uninstall anything.

I checked my Windows folder and it is a whopping 15 GB now by itself.
 
I could have sworn you can uninstall windows features but I just looked and it isn't there. Uninstalling a program was different than uninstalling parts of your Windows 7 installation. I am not sure but I think it was changed to "Turn Windows features on or off" which doesn't look like it will uninstall anything.

I checked my Windows folder and it is a whopping 15 GB now by itself.

I am going to install the windows 7 32Bit version on mine as it takes up a lot less space than the 64bit version
 
Try CCLeaner. Its a utility that will let you identify possible things to remove, including old restore points. Windows is a pack rat.
 
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