installed vista and 40GB are used up!!! why?

[usktech]

hi,

i just helped a friend buy and set up a new laptop
(HP Compaq 6715s, Sempron 3800+, 15.4" WXGA,
1GB, Vista Home) and i installed vista on it (included
in the package) and it said that half the harddisk (40/80)
was used up. what is wrong?

we also had another problem, this is what happened:
it worked for 2 days;
then on the third day after some time of use, there
was a smell of burnt wire, and as a reflex, my friend
turned the laptop off;
later that day she tried again and it worked, exept
for a small problem (the USB connection was so-so,
but worked in the end);
the fourth day she tried turning it on and it said that
it had no more batery, but it had never been unpluged
from the power supply...
what is wrong? need feedback asap.

thx for any help

 

[Scotteq]

The smell of burning electronics is NOT NORMAL. RETURN the laptop.

 

[usktech]

yeah that is clear. we probably will return it, but if it can be avoided...

also any idea why half the HD is used up?

 

[Scotteq]

Vista detects existing installations and will put the existing data into a folder called WINDOWS_OLD. Now, it's only a theory since I have no idea what was or was not on the computer before you did the upgrade. But it could be that you have 2x the data you should....

 

[cboath]

I installed vista 64 bit on a drive split 20gb for the OS and 140gb for programs, before installing anything other than windows i still had 12-14gb free space on the 20gb drive. 1 year later there's still 10gb free. Not sure where 40gb came from. I can't imagine an 80gb drive coming from a store bought system being THAT full - unless the system restore size was set to an VERY high number.