OS took my harddrive space

Toggle sidebar Toggle sidebar
D

dextilitygamer

Commendable
Oct 4, 2016
1
0
1,510
So, i'm building a new pc (still waiting for the last parts but doing the prep work) and i bought the OS for it, downloaded it to my external harddrive wich contains a lot of other stuff. Suddenly all of the other files are gone and now it says i only have 31GB total, when i originally had 1TB, i tried to format the disk because i thought to hell with the old files i just want my space back, but it didn't work. is there any way to fix this?
 
Solution
RealBeast
I assume that you used the Microsoft tool to create an install media for Windows 10 using your HDD as that tool?

That would make sense since using that tool since Microsoft warns to use an empty USB stick or DVD "because any content on it will be deleted."

If you just want the space back now (and are willing to lose the downloaded installer), use diskpart to clean the drive as follows:
(with the drive attached to a Windows machine open an elevated command prompt window by right clicking on command prompt and selecting run as admin, and enter these commands)
diskpart
list disk
select disk n (where n is the external drive with the issue)
clean
list disk (just to insure you are still on the desired disk, it will have an asterisk next to...
Sort by date Sort by votes
RealBeast

RealBeast

Titan
Moderator
Sep 13, 2010
17,109
473
104,790
I assume that you used the Microsoft tool to create an install media for Windows 10 using your HDD as that tool?

That would make sense since using that tool since Microsoft warns to use an empty USB stick or DVD "because any content on it will be deleted."

If you just want the space back now (and are willing to lose the downloaded installer), use diskpart to clean the drive as follows:
(with the drive attached to a Windows machine open an elevated command prompt window by right clicking on command prompt and selecting run as admin, and enter these commands)
diskpart
list disk
select disk n (where n is the external drive with the issue)
clean
list disk (just to insure you are still on the desired disk, it will have an asterisk next to it)
create partition primary
select partition 1
format FS=NTFS label=<enter the name you want the drive to have here, without the <> marks>
assign letter=<enter drive letter here that you want to use>
exit

HERE is a complete diskpart syntax guide.

If you want to use it as the Windows installer so you don't have to download again, then install first, then go through the cleaning process.

 
Upvote 0 Downvote
Solution
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Latest posts

Moderators online

Share this page

COMPANY
RESOURCES
FOLLOW
Top Bottom