I have a really weird problem:

Windows 8 keeps reporting that my 128GB SSD is full. It'll "fill up" the 60GB of free space by the end of the day. I'll reboot, and all the free space returns.

Doing a file search shows the amount of space in use that I would expect, about 60GB. (Set to show all files, nothing hidden, etc.

Using WinDirStat has the same result, the amount of files found is about half the space the drive reports as being in use.

No errors in the logs other than those caused by the drive being full.

No errors found by chkdsk.

Any suggestions on what to look at next?

Hi,

Does your Windows 8 upgrade from Windows 7 or a clean install? Did this issue occur before?

Try to optimize your driver in Windows 8, and perform a whole disc scan to check if any virus on your PC.

Regards,

Leo   Huang

Run the Resource Monitor and look which process writes data to the SSD:

http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/closer-windows-resource-monitor/

Hi Leo,

Fresh install on a never before used SSD. No infections. Optimizing is a fancy new term for Defragging and I can't think of how that'd reclaim used space, but I suppose it's possible.

It looks like a file called "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Search\Data\Applications\Windows\Windows.edb" is growing huge, it's currently at 13.4GB, and then get's zapped automatically when I restart.

I'll need to give it some time to keep growing and confirm, but is this some sort of Windows 8 known bug?

It looks like a file called "C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Search\Data\Applications\Windows\Windows.edb" is growing huge, it's currently at 13.4GB, and then get's zapped automatically when I restart.

this file belongs to the Windows Search. Reduce the number of indexed folders.

For some reason it was indexing my .ISO's folder. Removing that from the list seems to have addressed the problem.

Still boggles my mind that the index grew to almost 100GB. There ISO's themselves aren't that big. 

For some reason it was indexing my .ISO's folder. Removing that from the list seems to have addressed the problem.

nice to hear that you've fixed it.

It's up to 32GB again, even after unchecking the .ISOs.

I've just limited it to the minimum now, email, my user profile, IE history.

This really seems to be a significant bug, it shouldn't be possible for the index to be consuming 1/4 of all the space on a drive, much less NEED to get to 30+GB in size.

It almost would be worth it to have a huge index file, except that searching in Outlook 2013 is buggy and laggy as can be.

Sigh, I suppose the next step is going to be to completely disable search. Thing is, that's shooting the patient to save his life... the idea is to fix problems, not patch around them.

Just got a hard drive is full notice... damn file was over 65GB.

Does anyone have ANY suggestions on how to address this?

Heck with it, I'm just going back to Windows 7.

Honestly, after a couple of weeks of fiddling with it, I'm still looking for a reason to justify the huge user training issues upgrading my company to it would involve. 

Think we'll be waiting to see SP1, or even for Win9.

You might want to turn off indexing entirely.  It's not necessary, and it's especially not necessary with an SSD.

The same holds true for Windows 7.

 

This seams to be a bug. Contact the MSDN/Technet Support and ask them for a solution (maybe a hotfix).

For what it's worth I've hit this as well.  My Windows.edb file has grown to 183GB (20% of my entire disk) and continues to grow to fill all space as I clear out "regular" files.  I suppose I'll kill the index service soon, but I'd rather not.  Anyone run across a solution?

Hello,

Are you using the RTM version of Windows 8 rather than the Release Preview version?

Yes, RTM.  FYI I have disabled Windows Search and the issue has gone away (except I no longer have fast searches)

You no longer have fast results from what Microsoft calls "Windows Search", but those aren't real search results.  That facility, which could more aptly be called "Windows Produce Something Interesting to Placate the User", misses stuff.

If you want to be sure that you're finding all of what's on your disk when you do a search you need a 3rd party tool.  I'm dead serious.  Thus disabling indexing is a completely positive thing, with no downside.

 

@Noel... I don't disagree with you and your point.  It skips all sorts of file extensions and types that I'd prefer it had indexed.  Nonetheless, it shouldn't suck up my hard drive if I haven't chosen to disable it...

Hello,

Could you go to Control Panel, choose Indexing options

Take a screenshot of that and make it available.

This shows the number of items and what folders and drives are being searched

I re-enabled the index service, let it run to completion, and took the snapshot.  I removed some personal-identifying folder names.  The database size seems perfectly reasonable after this process at roughly 700MB.  Note that with zero configuration changes (and actually few changes the the indexed files themselves), this database was, like I said above, 183GB when I decided to kill the service.

I will let it continue to run to see if it gets back into its (seemingly?) infinite growing state.

Considering the bad luck you've already had with it, are you willing to trust that what it's stored in its indexing database is anything like what's in the files on your disk?

I'm surprised by the desire of people to use such an obviously flawed system, when in fact it can be disabled and what you get by doing so (even though it may take a little longer) is actually more accurate.  Not perfectly accurate, mind you, because Windows Search misses things by design, but certainly better than indexed results.

If you're constantly doing a lot of searches and find yourself waiting, may I suggest investing in SSD technology?  I have an SSD array and I guarantee you I can actually search the entire disk faster than someone with an indexed spinning hard drive.  Prices for SSDs have been coming down a lot.

 

For some reason it was indexing my .ISO's folder. Removing that from the list seems to have addressed the problem.

What is the total size of the data Space your indexing ... guess you're not keeping all your data on a 128GB SSD.

So how many TB's do you have around?

I just checked the index of a file server workspace around 1 TB - and the index was 4 GB.

You could take a look at File Exporer Libraries for all users. Those locations get indexed as well (I guess). I.e. removable storage.

Also note simulation of any local resources like drive mapping to shares on i.e. a NAS or use of symbolic links - and having those file hierarchies included in your libraries.

But could be a concern with smaller SSD's for the system volume and system files growing - in this case the search index - while moving files from the file server to removable harddrives attached to the libraries ... and storage space coming up. I.e. Still using a file server here. So the search index mainly grows on the file server.

Anyway 50 gb to 100 gb for the search index is a lot. Guess you don't have like 15-20 TB's and a matching number of files directly connected to libraries in that laptop or workstation. If you do, you can move the search index to another location.

I am also experiencing this issue... I've got my HDD broken up into 2 partitions with the OS being installed on a 100GB partition. 

The windows.edb file is consuming ~45GB!

Has there been any further feedback on this issue, or should I raise this with MS Support/Technet?

contact the support directly about this issue. this looks like a bug.

I have the same issue... After hours of research here's what I've come up with: The best tool I found to really see which files are "growing" and where in the file structure is spacemonger (you can try it for free for 30 days. It's really neat if you ask me. You can even interact with the folders and delete them right from the program). I saw that the hybernate file was the culprit so I turned it off.

Start > type Cmd in Search, then Ctrl + Shift + Enter
Now type the command powercfg -h off and restart.

Hope this helps! I've seen that other people have an issue with pagefile.sys which is used for virtual memory... Look into that as well specially if you see it on spacemonger... Hope this helps! Good Luck

I wish I had read this thread three months ago. I had my SDD fill up under windows 7, although it did not happen for the first year on my (then) new PC. Why the delay? Possibly after an 'upgrade', but that is a guess I can't prove. I took the beast (Chillblaster) to a small PC shop who swopped my hard drives round, putting the SDD as D drive and another disc drive as C. This proved to be unstable and in the process I lost all my data. I know I know! Serve me right for relying on an Acronis back up that proved not to have my data in it on an external HD (probably due to bizarre file structure that had developed). Went back to shop and had the 80 Gb SDD reinstalled with Windows 8. This pretty soon filled up and then I found this thread. 'File tree' showed the culprit to be a hibernation file as noted above. I then got help (from my brother in law who is an IT specialist) to zap hibernation,  which has cured the problem. 

Thanks to everyone above who helped me find the problem and showed how to cure it.

I draw several lessons from this story which I learned the hard way (as usual).

1. Don't trust a back up program. Burn your vital data and photos to a disc from time to time and especially ahead of any serious upgrade.

2. Don't trust small PC shops to find out what the problem is, when it is as deep and complex as this one.

3. Research on line before committing to any course of action.

Disclaimer: I don't "own" this file or any of the indexing stuff.

I too have seen this @ home.  I'm assuming you're probably hitting a very large C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Search\Data\Applications\Windows\Windows.edb file.  This is a known issue that is being investigated.

It is "safe" to delete windows.edb if it gets to be a crazy size.  The downside is that it will take a while for the search indexer to re-index, and in that time desktop search isn't going to work.  I have been periodically deleting mine if it explodes in size. 

Of course if you have a gigantic number of things being indexed, then the size may be normal.  For me, ~400,000 items being indexed takes 6-7GB.  I've heard that 1-2GB/100K items is typical.  If you have too many things for a small SSD or something, you may have to remove things from your index, or move it to a different drive.  You can see how many items are being indexed in Indexing Options.

I've discovered that I need to take manually delete windows.edb, and to do so, I have to stop the SearchIndexer process in taskmgr.  Usually it stays a sane size then for a few weeks before exploding again.

Hope that helps,

Shawn

Well, if it is being researched as a bug please update us ASAP.   My Windows 8 SSD (256GB) suddenly started spitting out drive space errors.  I used Treesize free to look - and sure enough, the Windows.edb search file was suddenly at 93GB!   Something bumped it somewhere is all I can figure.  In any case, shut off indexing, when to delete the file and let the disk recycle it (it wouldn't delete) and I am now back to 90+GB free.  

It was somewhat surprising since I usually good at monitoring my disk space.  Hope that update is on its way!

 

Just found this issue on a file server that I use at home. The index had grown to a whopping 906GB!

It used my entire hard drive until I had no space left.

This better be fixed soon, it is a huge bug.

the bug is already fixed.

Install the update KB2836988 (My update rollup).

Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 update rollup: May 2013

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2836988

This update package also fixes the issues that are documented in the following articles in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

2838018 The Windows.ebd file grows very large in Windows 8 or Windows Server 2012

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2838018

But you have to reindex the HDD to shrink the