Can I ...

Jovan_2

... either free up some of the space on D or at least use it to store, perhaps the download file or some program files? I have tried it with one program file and after making shortcuts for C it seems to work fine but I don't want to go any further without advice.

asininity

It should be fine, you can install programs anywhere it doesn't strictly have to be on the c drive in program files.

One thing I would do though is change the fat32 drives to ntfs as ntfs is a whole lot faster and secure.

DatabaseError

run ccleaner to safely free some space on C: (D is empty)

evilgoose

You could move your my documents folder onto the - right click the folder and select properties and move.

Could also delete any temporary internet files. and generally if there anything in a temp folder that can usually go aswell.

Jovan_2

Thanks for the responses everyone.

asininity, won't changing the drives to ntfs erase everything?

tonyhague, done that - ccleaner is a great little program 'aint it? - plus un-installed as much as I can.

evilgoose, thanks for the tip.

Just a bit of background. I have an external disc drive on which I stored pictures, videos, program files, download files ... a whole lot of stuff. Unfortunately it has stopped working, I am going to be taking it to be checked out and hoping I can some precious files back. But even if it can be fixed I really don't trust it any more so I maybe will be looking to buy a new one. Cost, obviously, is a big factor so until I can afford something new I'm hoping to be able to work with the space I have.

DatabaseError

Jovan wrote: »

...I'm hoping to be able to work with the space I have.

Sadly many of us expand our storage needs to fill the available space, I have 800Gb to play with, most of it full

asininity

@ Jovan

No it wont I've done it loads of times with my old acer laptop, acer for some reason use win 98 for their recovery partition so thats why you XP is in fat32 because 98 can't understand ntfs. If you buy a vista laptop from them they use xp for their recovery partition, go figure.

Having said that if you change the above means if you need to do a recovery or a fresh install your recovery partition wont be able to do anything until its re-formatted back to fat32 . You can't change it back though without loosing your data, it needs to be a fresh format.

If you type:

"convert fat32 to ntfs" in the help and support thing on xp it will tell you how to do it, if you can't be bothered heres a guide.

Hope this helps.

Jovan_2

Thanks, your help is appreciated.