viewing files on your hard drive

Hello,
There are many programs that claim to safely clean your hard drive but I have found that they all have their shortcomings so I am not in a position to recommend one at this time. Now, as far as being able to view the files on your hard drive, that can be done via navigating through windows explorer; however, I would strongly discourage this practice without a specific reason to do so.

Generally I don't recommend that users go around deleting files, mostly because they don't know what they are deleting.
That being said, go through the steps in this link here and then download WinDirStat and run it. The page I linked to gives you a quick howto on using it.

Now, a few rules for cleaning your system:
Rule #1. Make a BACKUP of your system. I recommend making an image with Acronis. You can download and use the free trial.
Rule #2. Do not delete anything in C:\windows\ or C:\winnt or C:\winxp or C:\win2k. Whatever your windows directory is. Do NOT delete anything in there.
Rule #3. Do not delete anything from c:\i386.
Rule #4. Do not delete Pagefile.sys

If you have any more questions please ask.

You can view the files on your system through Windows Explorer or My Computer. You can run Disk Cleanup to clear out most of the junk.

I use a free program called Advanced WindowsCare. I downloaded it from Tech product reviews for cell phones, computers, MP3 players - CNET. It cleans out spyware, viruses, and help free up your hard drive. It is very easy to use too.

Comments on this postTechEmperor disagrees: Windows Explorer is woefully underpowered and essentially useless from a system cleanup perspective. WinDirStat is 100% more useful. Disk Cleanup takes far too long for far too little return compared to CCleaner.

First, may I call your attention to the guidelines for using the comments feature found here:

http://www.askmehelpdesk.com/feedbac...ure-24951.html

My response to use Windows Explorer was to the question on how to view files. While Disk Cleanup is not the most efficient it is built into Windows. If you want to recommend othe rtools and extol their virtues feel free. But giving my response a negative comment was inappropriate.

The context was whether I agreed or disagreed with your statement. The answer you gave was not helpful and was actually incorrect when the original posters entire question was taken into consideration. Give better advice and I won't disagree with you.

Of course before you start manually removing files, try something simple like CCleaner.
This is a excellent FREE application that removes alot of the windows generated junk from your system as well as cleaning the registry and start up programs.
It's available here: CCleaner - Home

Tech "Emperor"
Hmm not sure about your "steps" for cleaning a system

Quoting :
Now while doing general maintenance on a system, while a back up is a good idea, it is over kill in this situation.
If you follow "rule" #2 then you wont clean out any of the TEMP files that exist in the Windows directories.
"Rule" #3, while true, is only really applicable to a business environment as home machines tend NOT to have an i386 folder.

BTW Scottgem is a MVP and an Expert in his chosen field with decades of experience.
Now I wonder whose advice would be better to follow ?!

Novices should always make a backup before deleting files. Always. There is no situation where a backup is overkill and if you think so then you need to get out of the technology field right now.
Also, if you had actually followed the links and read them you would see that the instructions in the first link do call for CCleaner to be run and for the temp directory to be cleared out.
Next, what makes you say that home PCs don't have an i386 directory? Any system from Dell has one regardless of market, which is going to be a significant portion of home PCs. It's clearly better to assume he does have that directory than assume he doesn't since in the first case no harm is done, but in the second case he could delete files that he later needs.

My solution is the correct one for this situation. It is better than Scott's solution, which was not helpful and it includes your recommendation of CCleaner.

While I am new to AskMeHelpDesk I am also an expert in this field with over a decade of experience.

First, as noted in the guidelines, the context is inaccurate vs accurate. There is nothing in my answer that was inaccurate. Whether your answer was better is not the issue. Therefore your rating was inappropriate.

Second, as noted you are new here, so before you start blundering about criticizing people inappropriately, it would make sense for you to understand how the site works and the rules for its use. I always do so before posting on a new site.

My answer dealt more with the issue of viewing files. Since others had already mentioned ways of cleaning out the system. I jhust threw in Disk Cleanup as anothter alternative. But to say my answer was not helpful, is ridiculous.

You are entitled to disagree with me all you want. If you do, just add a post to the thread. But the comments feature should only be used if an answer is wrong or inaccurate, My response wasn't either.

I have more than twice your experience with PCs. I suspect I was helping people with their computers before you even knew what a computer was. I also suspect I have a better handle on what the end user really needs than you do. I'm also curious as to what makes you an expert in the field? Clearly you are knowledgeable, but anyone can proclaim thenselves an expert. As Ben noted, I've been given expert status here, I've been award Microsoft's MVP award and I'm a published author. My expert status has been conferred on me by others, not self proclaimed.