Reduce the size of Vista's WinSxS Folder

Submitted by andrew on Thu, 10/30/2008 - 09:23

Windows Vista

I've been looking for this for a long time. On Windows Vista, there is a folder called "WinSxS", which stands for "Windows Side by Side". It's a part of the move to a "component" based architecture, where the WinSxS folder contains multiple versions of a component such as Windows Media Player or IIS, and the appropriate versions are hard-linked into the system. Unfortunately, Windows is stupid (surprise!), and provides no easy way to remove old versions. While it's understandable that users might want to uninstall updates for one reason or another, after the initial install it becomes pretty unlikely.

Now that Vista SP1 is out, there is a tool which will remove all of the RTM versions of updated components. Unless you plan on uninstalling SP1, there is no reason to keep these components around.

Cleaning out the directory is pretty simple. Click the start menu, and in the search field type vsp1cln. A single result should show up. I have UAC disabled on my system, so if it's an issue run cmd first, and run the utility through that.

I started with a WinSxS folder of 10.9 GB. After running the cleaning tool, it dropped to 8.48 GB - nearly 2.5 GB! While this doesn't matter so much on desktops, it could make a big difference in virtual machines, or on laptops.

It's too bad that there isn't a nice way to do this from a GUI. Hopefully SP2 will include one.

Comments

Thanks

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Tue, 04/14/2009 - 02:49.

I really believe this step involving the size of this folder in windows vista to be a step backwards for Microsoft. How does a department go about creating and deploying windows 3rd party images to PC's from a 20 GB Windows install with MS Office, I cannot believe MS took this route. ( Well it can be done but what a waste of time and disk space.)

Thanks for the Post though Andrew, again a MS solution that hasn't really worked as it has only reduced my WinSXS folder by around 2 - 3 GB and the folder is still 7.4 GB. When will MS start listening to consumers or at least think of consumers when making new products.

^^^ I agree. I also only

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 05/15/2009 - 12:45.

^^^ I agree. I also only have 20GB for my Vista partition (dual booting XP and only 80GB hard drive). I've been running Vista (Business) for a little over a year and now I'm at the point that I don't have enough room to do anything.

I only have 200 MB of free space and can't even install the lastest MS updates.

My Windows folder is 14GB and 8GB is winsxs! Program Files is under 3GB.

Now I'm looking at having to completely blow away my partitions and start over again! I really don't have 1 full day to reinstall 2 OSes again, let alone figure out all the programs, utilites, and other tweaks I've done to the system to get it fully functional.

I can't even begin to believe that we are at a stage where an OS needs to be over 14GB!

i just bought a SSD 32gb

Submitted by Phil (not verified) on Fri, 05/29/2009 - 23:57.

i just bought a SSD 32gb drive to install vista x64 on, my windows folder alone is 17GB, with 6gb of ram, the pagefile becomes 6.4Gb. it doesn't leave much space for installing apps like nero,office. Consider xp can be installed on a 200mb flash drive, and this fucking vista uses 26gb for install. wtf ? even after the method explained above, my winsxs folder is 11gb

really i'm not happy with

Submitted by almny (not verified) on Mon, 06/01/2009 - 03:41.

really i'm not happy with vista
after few days every day i found windows drive increases :(

http://www.vlite.net/ Make

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 08/28/2009 - 08:02.

http://www.vlite.net/

Make your Vista install take up less than half that.

I used nLite for my XP install on a Dell Mini 9, i am running Windows XP SP3 with all hotfixes and drivers for my laptop, and using less than 1GB for everything!

winsxs with no limit

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Sat, 08/29/2009 - 03:35.

After going through failed installations of MS Office and Nero Ultra serveral times, when they were installed finally, I was horrified to see that the winsxs folder grew to 17GB from about 10GB!
My Vista partition is only 21GB and I though it was very generous but now I'm worried because I still not yet installed other applications. I revisited my Vista documents and do not see any space requirement telling me about this winsxs business.
What on earth was MS thinking/smoking while building this OS!
Had MS put a warning about this winsxs, nobody would have bought this OS at all. Where do we get a refund...

Thanks for de info

Submitted by Desarrollo Web (not verified) on Fri, 10/16/2009 - 10:56.

Every time that I heard about new things on windonws, make me wanna change to my linux...

juanca

I have Vista SP2 and this

Submitted by Tensigh (not verified) on Sun, 02/14/2010 - 04:46.

I have Vista SP2 and this program doesn't exist. Is there an equivalent? I tried vsp2cln but to no avail.

My WinSxs folder is over 15 GB.

SP2 also includes a Service

Submitted by Help (not verified) on Sun, 02/14/2010 - 06:01.

SP2 also includes a Service Pack Clean-up tool (Compcln.exe), which
helps restore the hard disk space by permanently deleting the previous
versions of the files (RTM and SP1) that are being serviced by SP2.

How to-
Open Command Prompt as Administrator (when UAC is enabled) and click on
Continue to jump ahead.
Execute the command Compcln.exe
It prompts to make SP2 permanent on your computer. Press "Y" to confirm!

compcln

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon, 02/15/2010 - 15:37.

Looks like Vista SP2 has a program called compcln.exe which does the same thing. It warns that all service packs will be permanent before running.

Thank you for allowing anonymous posting! :)

perfect

Submitted by Angie (not verified) on Tue, 02/16/2010 - 09:32.

Thanks Excellent info xxx

i m thinking of not using

Submitted by destiney (not verified) on Tue, 02/16/2010 - 12:55.

i m thinking of not using vista anymore..i have 30GB for my C partition and winsxs takes 10GB!!so the window files in total take about 18.1GB!!!!
I always delete and uninstall programs but to no avail.. it keeps eating my space!!its really frustrating!now i only have 112MB in my c drive...i cant run any updates or install any programs..everytime i delete something to free up the space...an hour later..the space is eaten up!
i hate vista!!

22 GB Winsxs file.

Submitted by Hasta La Vista Baby! (not verified) on Tue, 03/02/2010 - 06:45.

I am now running the SP3 file Compcln.exe. Thank you. I was shocked it was 22 GB and running it reduced it to 18 GB. That is still a massive amount of goo in the system. Ouch!

VISTA SP1

Submitted by Sleepyjohn (not verified) on Wed, 04/14/2010 - 21:27.

For you folks that make it down to this comment, the VISTA command that you are typing had the number one in the middle of it: Vista Service Pack 1 CLeaN , so you are typing in VSP1CLN. Please ensure you see/type the difference between the number 1 and the letter L.

MS has lost the plot...

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 04/22/2010 - 06:11.

The really good software to come out of MS are the ones NOT written by them. Microsoft Security Essentials is one of the best and that was inherited by MS when they bought up the small company that had developed the software. Compared to FOSS developers, MS has a bunch of cretins. I had a 25GB partition for my Win7 install and within 1 month, I have run out of space. The Windows and Winsxs folders account for most of it. Ridiculous !!

9.5 GB to 8.7 GB...woohoo? Not so much...

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Thu, 05/20/2010 - 10:17.

When I type VSP1CLN the command is not recognized...maybe because I already have SP2?
Anyway, I ran compcln.exe and only got about 900 MB free...what a load! I hate Vista and thankfully this is the computer I have at work. When I go home, I don't have to put up with Vista or any other Microsoft garbage.
My OS is over 17 GB now - that is outrageous.

An OS is supposed to help you get your work done and be out of the way, not take over! OSX works way better and without the need for a third of my HDD space.

I used CompCln and reduced

Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 06/04/2010 - 09:06.

I used CompCln and reduced the WinSxS folder in my vista system from 23.3GB to 17GB still alot of junk I presume..also found this little explanation..

in a November 29, 2008 post on Microsoft’s MSDN blog,
Michael Beck gave the following definition:
“In practice, nearly every file in the WinSxS directory is a “hard link” to the physical files elsewhere on the system-meaning that the files are not actually in this directory. For instance in the WinSxS there might be a file called advapi32.dll that takes up >700K however what’s being reported is a hard link to the actual file that lives in the Windows\System32, and it will be counted twice (or more) when simply looking at the individual directories from Windows Explorer.” - Taking his explanation a step further, Beck explains that because of this hard linking, Windows Explorer may misreport the actual size of the WinSxS folder.
According to Beck: “The Windows SxS directory represents the “installation and servicing state” of all system components. But in reality it doesn’t actually consume as much disk space as it appears when using the built-in tools (DIR and Explorer) to measure disk space used. “

About 1.5 GB , i reduced

Submitted by Hasanless (not verified) on Sat, 06/26/2010 - 15:54.

About 1.5 GB , i reduced winsxs By Compcln
total space now 9.17 GB !!!!!

15.2 GB

Submitted by J Henry (not verified) on Tue, 06/29/2010 - 18:38.

Vista Home Premium 64 bit with about 1-1/2 months use and the winsxs filder is 15.2 GB. There are multiple folder copies of microsoft-windows-t..krecognition.zh-chs, microsoft-windows-naturallanguage6, microsoft-windows-s..chrecognizerenu.ale, microsoft-windows-mediaplayer-core, microsoft-windows-ime-korean-hwresource and all kinds of other garbage, gigs of wasted space.

I have read all about the winsxs folder, why it is there and what it does and despite all the poor M$ techs trying to justify its existence, reading between the lines, they hate it too and can't say so.

I am stunned, STUNNED, that we have no way of getting rid of all this trash that does nothing but chew up our C: drive space. What a crappy system. It's just M$ screwing consumers yet again.

Ahhhhhh..at last. my computer

Submitted by Anonymous1 (not verified) on Tue, 07/20/2010 - 01:02.

Ahhhhhh..at last.
my computer was full....i spent the last 2 days deleting and uninstalling.....everytime i freed up som space it filled up again, it seemed to do so with a vengence, it got so bad i couldn't delete a file...Treesize personal showed that bloody itunes was smthg like 4Gb in the roaming folder despite uninstalling and this winsxs thing was 14Gb....hard drive was partitioned to 33Gb, windows was 20G of that....anyway the compcln saved me 2.5G Cheers!!!