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[Question] Win98SE + all updates = 200meg -> 817meg


TravisO

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I recently started using Virtual PC 2004 to run some other OSs on my computer.

I'm creating 3 different Win98SE setups for testing:

#1 just a standard install, no updates,

#2 includes all WindowsUpdate fixes (IE6 SP1, WMP9, .Net 2.0, patches, but no DX updates)

#3 (once I fix the bloat of #2) will be the same as #2 except I will apply uSP2.

As the title states, my standard Win98SE install was only like 230megs, I copied this setup, applied all the updates and now it's bloated to 820meg, any suggestions where I can remove some bloat?

I've already cleaned:

C:\Windows\Temp\

C:\Windows\Microsoft Downloaded Updates\ (I forget the proper name of the folder)

I also set IE's cache limit to 10megs and cleared what was there.

I suspect that .Net 2.0 might have left some residual install files, along with IE SP1 and WMP9 but I can't find them. I can't believe that a clean Win98SE /w all updates really needs 820megs.

Please note I am NOT interested in removing applications or nLite'ing this setup.

Thanks in advance

Edited by travisowens
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I recently started using Virtual PC 2004 to run some other OSs on my computer.

I'm creating 3 different Win98SE setups for testing:

#1 just a standard install, no updates,

#2 includes all WindowsUpdate fixes (IE6 SP1, WMP9, .Net 2.0, patches, but no DX updates)

#3 (once I fix the bloat of #2) will be the same as #2 except I will apply uSP2.

As the title states, my standard Win98SE install was only like 230megs, I copied this setup, applied all the updates and now it's bloated to 820meg, any suggestions where I can remove some bloat?

I've already cleaned:

C:\Windows\Temp\

C:\Windows\Microsoft Downloaded Updates\ (I forget the proper name of the folder)

I also set IE's cache limit to 10megs and cleared what was there.

I suspect that .Net 2.0 might have left some residual install files, along with IE SP1 and WMP9 but I can't find them. I can't believe that a clean Win98SE /w all updates really needs 820megs.

Please note I am NOT interested in removing applications or nLite'ing this setup.

Thanks in advance

Here are the minimum space requirments for some programs mentioned above.

WMP 9 needs 100mb

IE6SP1 needs 12.4mb

.Net 2.0 needs 280mb

This could account for alot of the space that is missing, especially .Net 2.0

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WMP 9 needs 100mb

IE6SP1 needs 12.4mb

.Net 2.0 needs 280mb

Wow, some of those figures are insane. Who would think a download the size of ~15megs would chew up 100 to 280 megs.

Well after using these figures then I have almost 200megs to span across all the updates.

PS: Thanks for the help, but it's forum bloat to quote large posts (Sorry, pet peeve of mine) :)

Edited by travisowens
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WMP 9 needs 100mb

IE6SP1 needs 12.4mb

.Net 2.0 needs 280mb

You might want to consider .NET 1.1.4322.573 instead... it takes up less space than the 2.0. As for the WMP, I recommend v6.4 or 7 as those are much less bloaty.
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I'm a .Net developer and all my new stuff is in .Net 2.0 only, so downgrading is not an option, although considering the bloat .Net 2.0 contains, and even beside that, all new stuff written in .Net in general will be 2.0 because it's faster and uses a little bit less ram.

Downgrading WMP is definetly an option.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Actually I found out how to remove bloat from Virtual PC images, you can find the tutorial at:

http://thespoke.net/blogs/travisowens/arch...hard_disks.aspx

-----------------------

While Virtual PC can resize a hard disk image larger as needed, it won't shrink it back down if large files are deleted. Because of this your hard disk image can easily grow out of control. After looking through some Microsoft documentation and web chats I found out how to shrink files in VPC2004 (I use SP1, which might be required).

This is NOT an issue with swap files and such, here's the official way to shrink a VPC size...

Step 1: flush your temp files, found in:

C:\Windows\Temp\

C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Local Settings\Temp\

C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Local Settings\Temporary Internet Files\

Step 2: Boot up the OS, run defrag on the HD and make sure you enable the setting to "put everything at the beginning of the drive"

Step 3: In your VPC session menu choose "CD" > "Capture ISO Image" and choose "Virtual Disk Precompactor.iso" which you can find in "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Virtual PC\Virtual Machine Additions\"

Step 4: You should have a new drive available, if not, reboot your OS session

Step 5: Once you double click the ISO mounted as a drive, it will prompt you to compact your HD image. At this point it will only "prepare" the image for compacting. This can take awhile!

Step 6: Shutdown your OS

Step 7: In VPC choose "Settings" for your image in question, and go to the "Hard Disk 1" section and on the right side you can use the "Virtual Hard Disk Wizard" button.

Step 8: Choose to edit an image and find your target image and choose to "Compact" it. This can take awhile too!

Done!

If you scroll to the bottom of my first source you can reade of some extra tricks to shrink the drive even further but I found this easy method to be very effective and give back the majority of the wasted space.

Sources:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?...2Fwct032304.asp

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?...b;EN-US;Q833138

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