Impact of Restore Points on disk space

I fitted a 'Crucial' MX500 250GB SSD and installed Windows 10 64-bit, v1903 on it. It is now build 18362.295. I also installed the recommended 'Crucial Storage Executive' (CSE) software. Everything works fine but I noticed that the amount of 'Used' space varies without me doing anything. On 30th August it showed 78.6GB 'Used' and on 31st August it showed 80.5GB 'Used'. I had lost 2GB of SSD space.

I checked and there was a Restore Point (RP) created at 17:26 on 30th August which was taking up 280MB. This RP was a 'Scheduled' RP unassociated with any program or driver updates. Because no programs would be affected by its deletion (and I have Macrium Reflect backup images saved) I deleted the RP. I then restarted my computer and found that deleting the single 280MB RP gave me back the 'lost' 2GB. How does deleting a 280MB RP give me back 2GB SSD space? Is it a Windows 10 thing or do earlier Windows versions behave the same way? Any thoughts?

wiganken said:

I checked and there was a Restore Point (RP) created at 17:26 on 30th August which was taking up 280MB. This RP was a 'Scheduled' RP unassociated with any program or driver updates. Because no programs would be affected by its deletion (and I have Macrium Reflect backup images saved) I deleted the RP. I then restarted my computer and found that deleting the single 280MB RP gave me back the 'lost' 2GB. How does deleting a 280MB RP give me back 2GB SSD space?

First, how did you check for that RP, by opening System Restore? By default it only displays the latest RP. You have to tick 'Show more restore points to see them all.

Second, how did you delete the RP? Disk clean up can delete all but the latest, Configure system restore can delete all, but there's no option to just delete one. There may have been more than just the one RP you were aware of. If so, all the others would have been deleted along with the one you deleted.

Restore Points are stored in the hidden and virtually inaccessible C:\System Volume Information folder. TreeSize Free is one of the few file managers that lets you explore it.

You can use CCleaner to review restore points and selectively delete them. I've turned off system restore on most of my PCs and rely on Reflect for system recovery. You can also configure how much of your disk space is used for restore.
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Most of the time MR can fix underlying problems.
On occasion restore points work when MR cannot be used.
For example when USB2 and USB3 are unavailable/malfunctioning.

zbook said:

Most of the time MR can fix underlying problems.
On occasion restore points work when MR cannot be used.
For example when USB2 and USB3 are unavailable/malfunctioning.

Why if the USB ports were working when the MR backup was done?

Depends on whether MR backup image is on another partition on the same disk drive or on an external drive that is no longer available.

zbook said:

Depends on whether MR backup image is on another partition on the same disk drive or on an external drive that is no longer available.

I still don't understand this. If the USB ports were working when the backup image was taken, why wouldn't they work on restore?

For example there are many backup images on an external HD.
The OP develops inaccessible boot device.
None of the USB ports work.
How do you use the backup image?

zbook said:

For example there are many backup images on an external HD.
The OP develops inaccessible boot device.
None of the USB ports work.
How do you use the backup image?

The external drive probably has a SATA interface so install it as an internal drive. Else could copy the backup to the cloud depending how much space you have.

OP has a notebook with no extra bays.
How can you use the backup image without working USB ports?