Remove sample mov files from winsxs

I want to free up some space on my C drive and would
like to remove the sample TV files that come with Vista
Ultimate and are found int he winsxs directory. The
problem, based on new security rules with vista, even
the administrator has no rights to delete these files.
How can it be done?

Thanks

I have Ultimate and I have no .mov files in windows\winsxs... must've been
put there by QT installer or some other app. At any rate... have you tried
changing permissions on the files in question?

Lang

IIRC, those movie clips (from Apollo 13, Vertigo, etc) were somewhere in the
Public folder before I deleted them.

Try to delete them in Safe Mode. As your computer is booting up, keep
pressing F8, and you will get an option to start in Safe Mode.

Because of problems I was having with network and video
drivers I had to do an install upgrade. It kept all my
previous settings and resolved all my video and network
problems, but place these in the c:\windows\winsxs
directory. This directory cannot have files removed, as
full security privlidges are given only to the
trustedinstaller (not even the administrator). I would
like to get these files off the system.

Thanks

Gerald

I understand that the winsxs folders looks like a good place to go if you
are trying to free up space on the drive, since it is huge.

The problem is that this folder is where the Vista Resource Protection
lives. It's best to not try and change the security, permissions or try and
selectively delete files from that folder.

You might want to start with Disk Cleanup and get rid of all the temp files,
older system restore points, the windows.old folder (if it is present), etc.

If hard drive space is getting critical, a good quality external drive is a
good solution for storing files.

This is a 40 GB drive with nothing but the OS on it. All
other programs (MS Office etc) are stored on another
drive. I don't understand why Vista Ultimate has to
consume 14 GB of space just for the OS. Now if those
files are critical, they should be able to be moved to
another drive?

Your maximum size for System Restore may be way too large, you should adjust
this. By default Vista sets the maximum size allocated for VSS (Volume
Shadow Storage) to 15% of the disk size. With some of newer drives, this can
result in a huge amount of space being allocated and used.

First, free up all of your disk space by deleting all but the most current
restore point. Go to Start/All Programs/Accessories/Disk Cleanup and you
will see the option there.

Go to Start and type cmd.exe in the results, right click the cmd.exe
item and
select the "Run as administrator" option. OK the UAC prompt.

When the command window opens, type the following.

vssadmin list shadowstorage

Press ENTER.

The result will show the current amount of Used, Allocated, and Maximum
allowed size for the Volume Shadow Storage on your system.

The following command will set the maximum amount of disk space used for
the shadow
storage to 2GB.

vssadmin Resize ShadowStorage /For=C: /On=C: /MaxSize=2.0GB
Press ENTER.

(type the command as shown, including the spaces)
You should see a message that the command succeeded.

This command assumes that your system drive is C:


--

Ronnie Vernon
Microsoft MVP
Windows Shell/User

So what you are saying is that if you delete files from winsxs it will
definitely be bad?

But getting rid of System Restore points and other programs are a good
thing?

Seems like MS opinions and preferences take precedence over those of
users.

Simply put: If users want a lighter system then users will have a
lighter system. You may not be the ones to provide the system if you
refuse to give users what they want.

B.T.W. selectively deleting files from winsxs can reduce winsxs from
20GB down to a few hundred Megabytes and still leave you with a stable
system.

When you do this *experimentally* it is a good idea to backup your
entire O.S. using whatever method(s) you prefer... or simply start
experiments on a newly installed system made for experimenting.

I personally encourage people to do this... as SSD's are quite
expensive. You will soon learn what winsxs files and folders are really
needed and I encourage you to post what you learn on a tech forum.

Say, "NO" to MS bloatware.

Realize the reason MS MVP's say this is bad is because if you delete
something that your system will require later then that program will not
run. That is the risk. Rather than saying, "You can't do that" I say
these are the risks... do what serves you best.

If you get good at restoring from a backup you can do what you want
without fearing ignorance. A good idea for SSD's is to tweak the systems
on those drives and have a working backup on a standard HDD to fix
anything that may go wrong on the SSD in no time.

Like I say, from several Gigabytes down to a few hundred Megabytes and
working faster and better than any O.O.Box install. You can definitely
delete those sample movie files without ANY concerns whatsoever.

You just need to find a way to delete them, whether using an
alternative O.S. Live CD or taking ownership of the files... they are
deletable... everything is deletable.

Windows 7 Home Basic Install winsxs after tweaks:

Size: 191 MB (201,156,180 bytes)
Size on disk: 210 MB (220,360,704 bytes)

B.T.W. everything runs fine on my computer...

except for one program due to missing winsxs file:

That program is "Eraser 586" a file shredder.

If I have a problem such as this I simply take my backup winsxs files
and return them in sections until Eraser works... or install a new
install and remove winsxs folders till Eraser does not work... either
way it tells me which winsxs folder group it is... then I can restore
functionality for the program I need and add that to my permanent winsxs
folder group.

Everything else works great:

System Restore,
Windows Updates,
All other programs ... too numerous to list... My Program Files folder
is quite large...

Everything is working great.

An experiential technique I will share with you is to simply make
copies of all the folders in winsxs... then delete all the files out of
the folders...

This gives you the empty folders which take up nothing in terms of
space.

Then you can start separating these folders into folder groups.

Group 1 proven mandatory winsxs folders
Group 2 assumed mandatory winsxs folders
Group 3 assumed unnecessary winsxs folders
Group 4 definitely unnecessary winsxs folders

RAR or ZIP the empty folders.

It is easy to remove the un-necessary winsxs folders after this by
simply CUTTING & pasting all winsxs folders from winsxs to a copy of the
neccessary folders and when asked DO NOT merge folders...

Whatever copies over was the un-necessary folders.

Whatever stays in place was necessary.

This is a fairly quick methods to start with.

In the definately unnecessary winsxs folder you can place the sample
music, sample movies, sample TV etc...

If you do not use Windows Media Center to watch Television with your
computer and never will then you can do the same with all of the Media
Center folders...

However do not do this with the windows media player unless you do not
want to have windows media player available for playing videos online or
downloaded to your computer... there are other media players out there
but I use windows media player...

I'll never use Windows Media Center to watch Television though with my
computer.

It is really unfortunate that MS does not give users who want better
options a tool for explaining these things and removing what the user
chooses.

200 MB compared to 21 GB is a huge difference... My Mom's computer sits
at over 20 GB in winsxs after only a year... from games .dll / side by
side controllers presumably. She plays games with her computer.

When you try to install a program that will not work because of missing
winsxs folders / files it will likely tell you its "side by side
component" is missing.

It would be great if it would install its own side by side component...
maybe if enough people lean up their computer through tech forums that
will happen


Perhaps tools for leaning up winsxs folders are plausible in the
future.

Till then it is up to the do it yourself-er. Shame isn't it!