These days, hard drives come with a huge amount of space and buying extra hard drives is getting cheaper by every passing month, but still the space will vanish very quickly. Whenever you browse through the internet or install an application, a lot of temporary files get generated which simply will mess up your system. Sometimes the nostalgia of older files which you have used earlier doesn't let you delete them. You don't always want to think or analyze which file you want and which you don't. So, we are giving a few clear instructions on how to make some free space in your system.
1) Use Windows disk cleanup
If you are using Windows 7, then click on start and type “Disk Cleanup”. Click on “Disk Cleanup” and then select the different drives you want to clean up. Windows will show you different deletable files and mention how much space you will get if you choose to delete these files. Once you click on OK, Windows will ask you to confirm your choice and then it will delete those file for you. You need to do this for all the drives in your system. Another way is to bring up the application by doing the right-click on the drive's icon from My Computer, selecting “Properties” and then finally “Disk Cleanup”.
2) Remove unused and unneeded Windows components
The same “Disk Cleanup” wizard have also an option to uninstall some Windows components which are not being used. Choose “More options” tab at the top and click on the “clean up” button under the Windows component. You can free up a lot of space by doing this depending upon your usage, such as, if you are not playing games too often then you can cleanup components related to games. You can always reinstall components later if you feel that you need them back.
3) Remove unused and unneeded applications from Add/Remove programs screen
Once you are at “Add/Remove Programs” screen, you can select a program and click on delete to uninstall and remove the program. A lot of software programs like a free browser installs some add-on which you don't really need. This activity can help you not only to increase space, but also help in simplify your system and increase performance too.
4) Cleanup your browser cache and temporary files
If you have installed Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome or Safari, then these browser's cache doesn't get cleaned up with the disk cleanup option (explained in point 1). You need to cleanup their history, cache and as well as the cookies your self. Over a period of time, if you don't cleanup this data, it will pile up and keep eating your disk space. Especially, when you use these browsers to watch videos or play music.
5) Empty recycle bin and delete all files permanently
Make sure that the files are deleted from the recycle bin as. After your cleanup activities are completed, then Defragment your hard drives. After selecting “properties” from “My Computer”, choose the “Tools” tab and then click on “Defragment now” to do the Defragmentation of your drives.
