256 GB SSD quickly ran very low on space Aspire E 15 E5-575G-57A4(Predator)

Hello,

I have c. I use it for very basic type of stuff (no gaming, streaming etc.). Over the past year, I kept getting warnings that my C: drive (which is 256GB SSD) is low on space. I used disk cleanup, moved all I could from C: to

drive (which has plenty of space btw), and deleted all unnecessary apps, temp files, etc. I don't have any restore points set up. Now, I'm not even able to push through a Windows update because I only have about 300MB of space left.

My Storage Usage app is showing that the majority of space is used by apps and games; yet, when I add them all up they only amount to 4GB instead of 212GB that the Storage Usage app is showing.

Any help is greatly appreciated!

Accepted answers

brummyfan2

No problem, you could use a third party program like TreeSize free to find out all the programs and apps occupying the HDD.
https://www.jam-software.com/treesize_free/

All comments

brummyfan2

Hi,
Run Disk cleanup as administrator, tick the box for Previous Windows Installations and click OK.

MaSk3

Thank you. When I pull up the disk cleanup, no Previous Windows installation(s) option is showing up. I may have already deleted/removed these a while back (since it may have been one of the ways I've dealt with the low disk space as this problem has been going on for a while).
...Unless there is a special way/method to run disk cleanup as admin that I'm not aware of??

brummyfan2

Hi,
Have you run the Disk cleanup as Admin? If not, right click Disk cleanup, click Run as Administrator.

MaSk3

Thank you. I did. It's not showing anything from previous Windows installations so I must have done this already in the past since this low space issue has been going on for a while. Please let me know if any other suggestions come to mind. I'm questioning if there's an issue with the laptop/disk itself since, as mentioned in my original post:
"My Storage Usage app is showing that the majority of space is used by apps and games; yet, when I add them all up they only amount to 4GB instead of 212GB that the Storage Usage app is showing. " ??

brummyfan2

No problem, you could use a third party program like TreeSize free to find out all the programs and apps occupying the HDD.
https://www.jam-software.com/treesize_free/

MaSk3

Thank you! I used the TreeSize and found out most of the space was taken by iPhone backups. I moved those out of the SSD drive and freed up 200GB! Thanks again!!