Dear All,I have may Windows Server 2008 installed with Hyper-V role in the production environment. This Server has saveral VMs running. C partition is 68 GB which is now 100 kb ramaining. Winsxs folder has accupied 60 GB space which is frustrating me plz some one help me to get rid of this.RegardsSKHATRI

hi there,many users have reported the issue of winsxs folder getting increased in size, this folder is basically a OS folder which you should not modifiy / play around with. OS stores dll refernce files in windows sxs ( side by side ) folder which is very much needed for OS to refer to particular version of dllbelow is the excellent post explaining the same ( they have explained for windows vista ) but windows sxs folder does same job on all flavour OS .http://social.technet.microsoft.com/forums/en-US/itprovistaannouncements/thread/9411dbaa-69ac-43a1-8915-749670cec8c3/sainath Windows Driver Development

Hy,Is there any way to get back the empty space or some thing coz it is too difficult to survive having a 0MB in C drive. i just want to know the method how to delete or make empty space coz now it has taken more then 60 GB size plz help me out to delete some files or give me the way through which i can get some empty space.RegardsSKHATRI

Hi SKHATRI, Based on the research, all the necessary files for specific additions, roles, applications will be contained in the %windir%\Winsxs directory. The %windir%\winsxs folder (also referred to as the component store) is used to store all the installation source files that is needed for Windows Server 2008 to service itself and its optional components, which takes the place of the traditional flat from media. All the shared and private assemblies, manifests, backed up system files, etc, are critical to the operation system of Windows Server 2008 and all of the installed programs. If any of these shared assemblies are removed and you install a program that requires that assembly, the program will simply refuse to run. Here is a blog which describe it in detailed.What is the WINSXS directory in Windows 2008 and Windows Vista and why is it so large?http://blogs.technet.com/askcore/archive/2008/09/17/what-is-the-winsxs-directory-in-windows-2008-and-windows-vista-and-why-is-it-so-large.aspxIf you want to decrease the space that the Winsxs folder takes, you may consider the way which is described in the following Blog.What's winsxs\manifestcache\(something)_blobs.bin?http://blogs.msdn.com/jonwis/archive/2009/01/13/what-s-winsxs-manifestcache-lt-something-gt-blobs-bin.aspxHope it helps. David Shen - MSFT

Hello Skhatri,Goto the \windows\winsxs\manifestcache folderWhat are the sizes of the *blobs.bin files in that folder?Thanks, Darrell Gorter[MSFT] This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights

Hi SKHATRI, As these files under %windir%\winsxs\ManifestCache\are used by the Windows Update mechanism in Windows Server 2008 and Windows Vista.It acts like a cache and is capped at a certain size, it's safe to delete these files. You may refer to the following steps to remove the file under the %windir%\winsxs\ManifestCache\ to release some disk space that the WinSXS folder takes. Run the following commands from an elevated command prompt: Net stop trustedinstaller NOTE: Wait for it to stop and ensure it stops successfully. If you are unable to stop the service, you may need to restart your machine. Takeown /f %windir%\winsxs\ManifestCache\* Icacls %windir%\winsxs\ManifestCache\* /GRANT administrators:F Del /q %windir%\winsxs\ManifestCache\* Hope it helps. David Shen - MSFT

I'm having this issue too, but my cache file as grown to about 200 GB and I am unable to take ownership of the *.bin.

Hi... it's wonderful that we now have a full explanation on the purpose of this folder...however, this doesn't help us in getting it cleaned up... Or are you guys actually saying there's no way (or no future plans) to implement something to clean this up... The folder will just keep growing and growing...indefinately? Then the question then stands, why wasn't this disclosed? I mean system requirements show Minimum: 32 GB or greater... My windows server 2008 server has a 40gb partition based on that figure... 14gb of which now belong to the SXS folder... This is also going to be the problem for Windows 7 users... Solution??? thks.. SJ

I know this is an old thread, but I gree with the last poster - telling us it's some important stuff just makes us throw our hands up in the air and complain about Microsoft. I started with the biggest SSD I could get from IBM and relucantly installed Server 2008 on it. Now, I'm totally out of room and it's apparently just old restore points and downloaded windows updates. I need to get rid of them! So is there a real solution? My ManifestCache has only one .bin in it, that's about a gigabyte in size. @David Chen: posting the same thing over and over doesn't contribute to much but the nice shiny medals under your name. Cut and paste much do you? :) == John ==== John ==

Hey John, We're in the same boat here. I've put up posts about this starting 8 months ago and I still have not heard a solid answer. There are even two different explanations from Microsoft as to the contents of the WinSXS folder: one article says that it only contains hard links and another says that it contains different versions of DLL's, updates, etc. The fact still remains that it is causing a SEVERE disk space issue. And the mantra that disk space is inexpensive is flat-out wrong. I'm sorry, but SSD and SAS drives are not cheap. We understand that this behavior of WinSXS is by-design, but based on what we are experiencing, we consider it a design flaw in Server 2008. We are having a great deal of frustration and, frankly, are wasting our time dealing with this issue. We have several servers that were built well-within the system requirements; but their system partitions have been filling up from the WinSXS directory and now Service Pack installations are not even possible. Also, on a test server I'm working with, our ManifestCache folder is only 200MB...not even a dent. Has anyone found a real-world, practical solution to this problem? Thanks, Steve

All... since we were getting nowhere fast on this thread, I opened another yesterday... Please see http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/winservergen/thread/bccb5f78-ce86-4be2-873a-f36544c7a8c9 for post and answer... thanks... SJ

FYI - I had to restart my server after deleteing the blob file in the ManifestCache folder to get my space back. My winsxs directory went from 40gb down to approx 10gb.

Something should to be done to allow safe trimming of bloat from this folder. It is pretty bad when you can't even install SP2 on a Vista box because the hard drive is full. And that is after applying pending patches from WSUS and adding Anti-Virus software after a clean installation. No other applications/services/accessories were installed. Attempts to utilize vsp1cln.exe did not provide sufficient free space to continue. (Note: on a Vista x86 box with SP2, compcln.exe recovered less than 400 MB space.) This box was built as a testing VM with a 20 GB hard drive (min recommended size for Vista x64 per MS site). Granted one can grow the size of the VHD on a VM but on a physical box or home user system, that may not be possible. If anyone were to attempt any additional application installs, they would be frustrated by insufficient disk space warnings. Given the size some others are reporting that the WinSXS folder has bloated to, even current computers can become choked over time.

I appreciate this is an old thread, but this problem is three hours old for me. Running treesize I discovered that I have 73GB of 139GB used on my drive. I like to keep my drive usage below 50% if possible to keep it fast (Velociraptor). Now I've been fairly good at changing the amount of space that the system volume area can use (10GB), and now I have to contend with a winsxs folder which was 19GB!! I've managed to trim it down using compcln and nifty batchfile by a clever person (gets rid of excess files, such as jpgs, WMP files etc). Now it's at 15GB or so. Why does Microsoft insist on bloatware? I don't want a 2TB drive. It's of no use to me if the OS in use behaves itself. Here's a couple of ideas for Microsoft. Rather than another batch of useless autoupdate and scheduler processes which won't die without a fight, why doesn't MS keep a database of the winsxs folder online, and have a scheduled check with the user's local winsxs? It can update only the pertinent files, leaving the user with the minumum requirements (removing obsolete and/or no longer needed files and folders periodically). If a user installs or activates a program or service, the system can check winsxs, then go online for the appropriate data and add it. Oh, and how about being able to limit system volume restore points to a number, rather than an amount of disk space? Stupid doesn't quite cover it, considering there are thousands of different installation sizes and types out there, and 20GB or whatever will not suit everyone. Allow us to make it 3 or 5 or 105 if we so wish. I am sick of deleting them, in spite of limiting the disk space allowed. Should I decide to, I might want to change from 3 to 10 to allow for many changes. Why should I change my disk space allocation? I am increasingly considering a side by side alternative myself....called Linux. A tenth of the hassle once you're familiar with it, while with Windows one gets it easy for the first six to twelve months, then spend the next two to four years trying to improve things. Less bloatware : More common sense please!