disk space

Force Snow Leopard To Report Hard Drive Capacity In Base 2

7:00AM Adam Pash | A lot of people were upset when they found out Snow Leopard was reporting hard drive capacity “correctly” in base 10; if you were one of them, here’s how you can fix it. More »

Snow Leopard Reports Hard Drive Capacity Correctly (In Base 10)

9:30PM Gina Trapani | ZDNet reports that Snow Leopard has changed the way it calculates disk capacity from earlier versions of OS X: now it’s actually accurate, and you can better judge when a disk is really, actually full. More »

Fast Duplicate File Finder Finds Your File Dupes

11:30PM Jason Fitzpatrick | Windows only: A little sloppy file keeping can lead to a lot of duplicate and space-hogging files. Dig up all the dupes with speedy Fast Duplicate File Finder. More »

Primitive File Size Chart Quickly Locates Your Drive-Hogging Files

7:00AM Jason Fitzpatrick | Windows only: If you’re looking to quickly get a snapshot of which folders and files are eating up your disk space, Primitive File Size Chart can help. We’ve covered other tools that help you see where your disk space is going, but it’s tough to beat the portable application Primitive File Size Chart for speed. You point it at a disk or directory, tell it how many files and folders you want listed, and it takes care of the rest. Results were returned within seconds even when scanning a packed 1TB disk. Primitive File Size Chart doesn’t have any fancy bells or whistles but it will give you the path, file name, and size of your largest files making short work out of assessing what is filling up your disks. Primitive File Size Chart is freeware, Windows only. Primitive File Size Chart [Freeware Home] More »

SpaceMonger Visualises Hard Drive Usage

4:00AM Lifehacker US Edition | Windows only: Free space analysis utility SpaceMonger visualises hard drive usage with a drill-down treemap view of your file system so you can quickly identify wasted space. Using the application is easy—launch the executable, pick a drive to analyse, and then drill down through the treemap to identify the files that are wasting space. If this concept seems familiar to you, it’s because we’ve featured many of these applications before. Previously mentioned apps like DriveSpacio, Windirstat, and Free Disk Analyzer all do the same thing with slightly different interfaces. This application is lightweight and contained in a single executable file, making it worth a look as another addition to your flash drive toolkit. SpaceMonger 1.4 is a free download for Windows only. The latest version isn’t free, but you can still download the freeware version from their downloads page. Thanks, Nik Coley! SpaceMonger More »

Free Disk Analyzer Finds The Largest Space-Wasting Files

10:30AM Lifehacker US Edition | Windows only: File space usage application Free Disk Analyzer quickly and easily finds the largest files that are wasting space on your drive. Once installed, you can locate the largest files by selecting a drive on the left-hand side, and then choosing the Largest Files tab on the bottom, which sorts by file size regardless of the directory they are located so you can quickly identify files for deletion. Hidden behind the options panel you will find some even better settings—the ability to filter by file type, or only analyse files larger than a specified size, making this a great utility for cleaning up your drive. Free Disk Analyzer is a free download for Windows users only. For a similar utility with more eye-candy, take a look at previously mentioned DriveSpacio. Free Disk Analyzer [via Freewaregenius] More »

Run Disk Cleanup Automatically At Startup

4:00AM Lifehacker US Edition | The CyberNet tech blog details how to create a set-it-and-forget-it scheduled task to automatically run Disk Cleanup every time your computer starts. The setup requires a few steps, starting with running Disk Cleanup from the command line with the /sageset:1 parameter to choose your settings, and then creating a scheduled task with the /sagerun:1 option to automatically run using the saved settings every time you start your computer. If you’d prefer to use the reader favourite CCleaner to clean up your computer, we’ve already detailed how to run CCleaner silently with a shortcut, or run it automatically with a scheduled task, which could be adjusted to run on startup. Automatically Empty the Recycling Bin at Startup [CyberNet] More »

DP Shredder Securely Shreds Your Files

3:00AM Jason Fitzpatrick | Windows only: DP Shredder scrubs files, folders, and free disk space with Department-of-Defense-approved methods. Completely stand-alone and small, DP Shredder is a great addition to your flash drive toolbox. After selecting the disk, folder, or file you want to securely delete with DP Shredder, you can select the method and number of times the method will be applied. You can use a basic overwrite with all zeros, pseudo-random blocks of data, or opt to use more robust methods. DP Shredder can wipe with the power of US DoD 5220.22.M ECE 7X—which, if you must know, deletes the files, overwrite all locations with a character, its complement, then a random character followed by an overwrite, and it’s repeated seven times. At the end of a single round, every bit of data you’ve deleted has been over-written 49 times. If you need more assurance that your data is gone, it’s time to break out the drill and find a far-away landfill or e-cycling centre. DP Shredder is freeware, Windows only. DP Shredder [The Portable Freeware Collection] More »

Xinorbis Analyses Your Disk Usage

11:30PM Jason Fitzpatrick | Windows only: Xinorbis is a portable and quite powerful disk analyzer. Graphs, tables, trees, and report generation ensure you know what is going on with your data. After scanning your disks—the results can be viewed individually for each drive or merged together to provide a system overview of all your storage—you can drill down into your data. Data can be sorted and graphed by file type, biggest folders, date of creation, 101 biggest and smallest files, and data distribution by user. Results can be saved with the Report function and compared to future scans. Additionally there is a basic file navigator that places a handy bar beside each folder indicating how much of the drive it takes up. Xinorbis is freeware, Windows only. Thanks SanwariCethegus! Xinorbis More »

Simple Directory Analyzer Gives Detailed Stats On Your Folders and Files

5:00AM Jason Fitzpatrick | Windows only: Simple Directory Analyzer provides a full range of tools for examining files and folders. Drill down through your data with a variety of filters to see how your space is being used. Simple Directory Analyzer uses a drag and drop interface to load directories, a time saver if you’re already staring at the folder you want to analyse and don’t want to browse through the directory tree in the Select Folder dialogue box. Once you drag a directory you want examined into the main window, you can apply filters based on size, file type, modification date, and more (you can even include sub folders) for a more detailed look at what’s going on in that folder. Simple Directory Analyzer provides additional tools for seeking out duplicate files and hidden files; it even boasts a handy Biggest Files function that allows you to quickly weed out only the biggest files in the directory. Like graphs? SDA can also draw simple graphs displaying your biggest files and most common file types. Simple Directory Analyzer is freeware, requires .NET 3.5, Windows only. Simple Directory Analyzer [via Freeware Home] More »