Drive Cleanup and WinSxS
An issue arose today where a customers SQL machine ran out of disk space on the system drive (C:) and we needed to clean up a little bit. Now, on a Win7 machine you just run Disk Cleanup and kill off those things that you don’t need. (Debug Dumps, Temp Internet Files, Temp Files, Install Logs etc.) But, for Windows 2008, Disk Cleanup is not installed by default so, how do you do it?
Well, the Disk Cleanup tool is available on 2008 and, all you have to do is add the Desktop Experience feature to the machine and you’ll have it.. Sweet, right?
“But I don’t want the Desktop Experience pack loaded on my Server, it’s not necessary!”
A VERY good point and, I agree.. So then how do we get the Disk Cleanup Tool? Fortunately, there is TechNet!
Viola! We can now use the tool intended to help us clean up all the ‘extra’…
“So what about this MASSIVE C:\Windows\winsxs folder that just keeps getting bigger over time?”
Actually, it doesn’t get a ‘big’ as you might think. I learned something new about WinSxS over at the Engineering Windows 7 MSDN Blog, take a read on this..
Very interesting stuff huh? 
Hope That Helps!
-Chris Rutledge