Folders that can be deleted

[ElAguila]

I installed Vista as an upgrade to my XP Pro setup. I was looking and I saw that the windows directory is now 9GB in size! I was wondering what folders would be safe to nuke. 3.4GB is in a folder called c:\windows\winsxs and I was wonder what this folder is and do I really need it.

Edited November 3, 2006 by ElAguila

[cluberti]

The DLLs corresponding to all application libraries not native to the OS have been grouped into several shared "side-by-side" assemblies and are installed into the native assembly cache, also called the WinSxS folder, under the operating system root directory. Similarly, while building an application using Visual Studio 2005, by default the compiler and the linker generate a manifest file that describes runtime dependencies of this application on libraries.

This directory is used to keep different versions of development libraries separate - think "dll hell" for applications requiring specific runtime libraries, and this as a way to reduce that (by providing the correct version of a library to a running app without overwriting another version needed by another app).

That's the non-technical version, anyway. Don't nuke it if you aren't sure you don't need it .

[fizban2]

basically they are making it possible for multiple DLL versions to coexist to take care of some many issues that result when DLLs are changed. just eats up more space. but from reading your sig EL, you seem to have some space to spare

[ElAguila]

Yep I have plenty of room. I was just wondering why I had over 9GB in my windows folder.

[MagicAndre1981]

this folder also exists under WindowsXP.