Cleaning Windows XP SP2

Windows XP SP2 takes up a lot of space on our hard disks. My ‘Windows’ folder is almost 2 GB in size.

Here I show you how to gain some space by cleaning SP2.

During installation, SP2 will create a restore point. Restore points takes up a lot of space and can be cleaned by going to Start - All Programs - Accessories - System Tools - Disk Cleanup and in ‘More Options’ click the bottom button to remove all but the most recent restore point.

You can also turn off System Restore by going to ‘System Properties’ page, select the ‘System Restore’ tab and check ‘Turn off System Restore on all drives’.

Delete the hidden folder of files that would be restored by an Uninstall:

C:\WINDOWS\$NtServicePackUninstall$

Once done, if you try to use the ‘Remove’ for Service pack 2 in Add/Remove programs, that will fail and offer to remove itself.

There may also be a large folder ‘C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution\Download’ depending on how you did the installation. That can also be deleted.

You can also compress drives to save space on a NTFS disk. To compress a drive, right-click it and select properties. Select ‘General’ tab and at the bottom you will find an option- ‘Compress drive to save disk sapce’. Check it and click ‘Apply’.