The Drunken Lizard Pub

So I finally got around to installing the 64-bit version of Windows 7... I know some people had some questions/concerns about the amount of drive space that it takes up.

First up, here's some specs:

AMD Phenom II X3 710 Processor (Triple Core, 2.6GHz)
4GB DDR2-1066
1TB Hitachi Hard Drive
AMD/ATI Radeon 4850 512MB

I installed the Professional Edition of Windows 7 64-bit. The only features it's missing over the Ultimate Edition is the extra languages and the Bit-Locker, neither being something I'll ever use.

Now, I forgot to immediately check my disk space after the initial install; but I did do a disk cleanup to delete temporary files I generated from web-surfing. So here's what I discovered after using it for a couple of days...


I can already hear the bemoaning and cries of outrage... but wait! There's more to the story!

I started snooping around my folders... so I started @ the root. Here's what my C drive looks like:


Okay... I examined the size of each folder and found the following:

ATI - 97.1 MB
Perflogs - 0 MB
Program Files - 202 MB
Program Files (x86) - 180 MB
Program Data - 8.8 MB
Users - 2.64 GB
Windows - 10.6 GB

Holy Cat Shoes Batman! a 2.6 GB User folder! A 10.6 GB Windows Directory!?! Well, come to find out, the User folder was where I had my downloads. And I just happened to have a bunch of files in there, including some iso's for Office 2007 and Windows XP Pro I grabbed from MSDN in case I did a re-install of XP.

But wait a second... there's only 13.7 GB accounted for... where's the other 3.1GB?? Aha!! I enabled the viewing of hidden files, but not of Protected Operating System Files!! Let's check that out!


Ah yes, the hibernation and page files... there's that other three--- wait a minute!?!? Seven gigs?? WTH?? Time for a Select All --> Right-click --> Properties:


Damn! Its like Windows is stealing space while I'm not looking!! Bad Windows 7!! Bad! But my drive properties still only reports 17 GB used!

Well after some fishing around... I found that the biggest folder in the Windows directory was the winsxs folder... it's like a temporary repository for information about installs, updates, drivers, etc. It was occupying 5GB of space! That's half the entire Windows folder!! However, I also found this interesting tid-bit:


So, the winsxs folder was more of a virtual folder! Well, by adding up all of the files and folders besides the Windows directory, we get 10.2GB. So, 16.8 GB - 10.2 = a 6.6GB Windows folder. If we apply that same logic to my dad's computer... I get a Vista Windows directory that's 18GB in size! Granted, it's not a "fresh" install, but it's still an impressive savings.

So the reality seems to be that a fresh install of Windows 7 takes up about 11-12GB, once I nuke the hibernate file that I won't need since I leave my computer on 24/7. For someone with only 2GB of ram, it'd be 9GB. It IS possible that it would be a bit larger, for one of the first things I did was turn off System Restore and disable the Windows Search. But those options generally take up space over time, as opposed to right away.

Now, of course this is about 8GB more than my Windows XP install, but hey, with a 1TB drive, who cares? The reasons for the "bloat" are mainly because you can't really control what gets installed... it dumps everything onto the hard drive. That way you can enable or disable Windows features on the fly, which is pretty nice. Obviously people with small hard drives are going to have issues with it, but I can understand the reasons for doing it the way they did.

Plus, I can tell you this... it sure as hell doesn't feel bloated. I even had the RC running on a Pentium-M Dell laptop and it was nice and responsive. Vista would have choked if I had installed it on the same configuration.

In the end, Windows Haters will keep on hating, and XP users will finally have no more reasons to gripe about upgrading... other than for the sake of griping. Mac Lovers will likely keep on lovin' those Macs, and Linux Gurus will keep on guru'ing. Microsoft will go on to sell millions of copies of Windows 7, which will give the Windows Haters that much more to hate. The Earth will keep revolving around the Sun, until it goes red giant an consumes the first three planets.

CrazyBernie wrote:Mac Lovers will likely keep on lovin' those Macs, and Linux Gurus will keep on guru'ing. Microsoft will go on to sell millions of copies of Windows 7, which will give the Windows Haters that much more to hate. The Earth will keep revolving around the Sun, until it goes red giant an consumes the first three planets.

Quite poignant. Thanks for the report/update.

I have a 74 GB hard disk, so I won't even consider installing Windows 7.

Well they're planning on making it the next big netbook OS, so don't be too surprised if you see some pretty lean versions of Win7 out there.