Hi
What if I install Windows into a 128-gig m.2-2242 SSD for my laptop?
Windows only need 20-gig to install,
but I know Windows will grow bigger as you do Updates and hibernate and such.
Would Windows be smart enough to limit itself if the drive is small?
Thanks!
p.s. It has 16-Gig Ram, by the way.
I have as my system drive a 500gb NVME drive and I've never seen it get more than 128gb in size.
Note that all my games are on a completely different drive and I have multiple storage drives in my system (see my system specs) along with a NAS. The only thing that's on my Windows system drive is the OS and apps that must be installed in Program Files.
Microsoft specify that a new OEM machine has to have a minimum of a 64GB drive in order for the OEM to be licensed to supply it with Windows pre-installed. The extra space is there to allow Feature Updates install smoothly. You should have no problems with Windows growing too large, your user files however, well that's up to you
I have several machines with only a 128GB SSD, they've not filled up yet. But then I routinely use Disk Cleanup to clean up System files.
Open and Use Disk Cleanup in Windows 10
That will offer to clean up Windows Updates if they have grown too much. Or, if you want to do that yourself you can do so at any time from a Command Prompt (Admin).
Clean Up Component Store (WinSxS folder) in Windows 10
First, size depends on your Windows + your apps.
Second, 128G does not translate into 128G, it's less due to:
- formatting / partitioning / file allocation tables / boot or rescue partition using your space
- hibernation takes away space
- suspend / sleep (hybrid sleep) etc also takes some space
- regarding the 2 previous points, how much space is needed depends on how much RAM you have
Also, not everyone applies all the Windows updates. The more you apply, the more space is used, and slower your computer gets. I'm one of those who keeps updates disabled.
Other than that, you should keep your used space around 45% of your disk or less (some might debate this). Why? SSDs work differently than mechanical drives and need some space to play around with what cells should be used. Some (in theory according to diff articles) use the available rated space, others use extra space you don't see (this is called over provisioning). Anyway, long story short, SSDs don't work exactly well filled up above 70%, specially if the disk is used for work (read/write) and not just for storage.
In case you find this useful: when SSDs first appeared they were expensive and the tech wasn't as advanced (ssds would show tear more quickly), what I did is placing a 120G SSD on my then laptop and replaced the DVD with a clever HDD caddy with my previous mechanical HDD instead, this allowed me FAST boot on Windows using very little space, and keeping lots of documents and backups on the mechanical HDD. That was many years ago!!! and still have that SSD around working pretty well.
As an experiment I have deliberately max'ed out my C: drive to see what happens.
What Windows will do is to automatically turn on Storage Sense to help you regain some space.
Enable or Disable Storage Sense in Windows 10
Windows 10 should be okay on a 128 GB Drive.
If you have another drive to save all your personal files / downloads / etc, then you should be good.
I have my C:\ Drive as the working drive, and other drives where I save my videos, music, documents, etc.
Windows doesn't fill up my drive when it's there by itself.
I have one computer with an OS disk of only 64GB.
It gets every update.
It runs without any problems.
Denis
Quote
