Hello!

I have a 28.6GB hard drive, and when I check the properties of C: it shows about 27.4GB used space and about 1.1GB free space. The problem is, I'm not really using nearly that much space. I've moved all of our music, pictures, etc. to an external hard drive, or else we would have run completely out of space by now. Yesterday I ran 4 separate disk analysis programs (Disktective, JDiskReport, WinDirStat, and Spacemonger), and they all showed the same amount of free space left, but they only showed usage of about 11GB.

What is happening?! I've read through all the other threads I can find on this topic, but nothing has helped. I've run CCleaner, I've unchecked "hide protected operating system files, I've run disk cleanup, I've turned off system restore, I've checked partitions (it shows 2 - one has 31MB and the other has 28.6GB). I've probably tried other stuff, but I can't remember now.

Any ideas?! Thanks a lot!

There are some various items, which take space.
For instance, System Restore, if left at default 12%, takes ~3.5GB in your case; hibernation file takes by default an amount equal to your RAM size; virtual memory takes 100-150% of the amount of RAM installed, and so on....
You're playing with fire, because one day, Windows may refuse to work, or even boot, if the free space is only under 4% (1.1GB). Windows needs at least 15% of free space to run correctly.

As I said in my post, System Restore is turned off and previous restore points have been deleted via disk cleanup. I also have hibernation turned off. My installed RAM is 1GB, so virtual memory would be about 1 to 1.5GB, not nearly enough to account for the 15 or 16GB I'm missing. Yes, I realize I'm "playing with fire." That's why I'm trying to figure out what's going on. I haven't done anything to take up this much space. I don't play games. I store all MP3s, pictures, and even my documents on an external drive. I don't download movies or anything like that. There's got to be something I can do to fix the problem. Thanks for the reply.