I'm thinking of installing an SSD on my machine at home, and the easiest way to do this is basically to clone my current hard drive over to the new SSD. Trouble is, if I right click on my current hard drive and select properties, my used space is 230GB, thus requiring me to buy a monster SSD.
However, if I right click on each of the top level folders in my hard drive and select properties, the total space used by those folders is only 140GB. 100GB of that is music and movies, which I can easily clean out before the move to the SSD.
So here's the rub, where did the other 90GB go? For the life of me I can't figure it out. Shouldn't the sum of the used sizes of all the top level folders in your C: drive roughly equal the used size of the C: drive itself?
Answer
There are hidden files and directories which contain system files that are not included in the calculation. System volume information, for example, contains your system restore points and volume shadow copies among other things. It is not included in the calculation because by default the ACL does not allow your user account to view the folder or it's properties. You can gain access to it if you really want to, however.
On another note, the cleanmgr.exe utility (better known as Disk Cleanup) can help you reclaim most of your disk space. The More Options tab allows you to delete all but the most recent restore points and Volume Shadow Copies.
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