Windows.old ? (Files on C Drive)

[Bilbo_baggin]

I recently bought Windows 7 32bit and installed in on the computer, but there is a hefty 154Mb folder on my C drive labelled "Windows.old" which has what I assume (they look like) lots of programmes from my previous OS installs. It has games in there and documents and all kinds of things.

I figure this is just a backup that the W7 install created as it installed?

So the question is:- Can this folder and it's contents be deleted to free up the space again? ( have copied the whole folder onto an external 1TB HD in case).


Bilbo.

[cyprus]

I recently bought Windows 7 32bit and installed in on the computer, but there is a hefty 154Mb folder on my C drive labelled "Windows.old" which has what I assume (they look like) lots of programmes from my previous OS installs. It has games in there and documents and all kinds of things.

I figure this is just a backup that the W7 install created as it installed?

So the question is:- Can this folder and it's contents be deleted to free up the space again? ( have copied the whole folder onto an external 1TB HD in case).


Bilbo.

As long as there is nothing in the folder you need, then yes, it's safe to delete. The folder is created with data from the previous OS before you installed the new one.

[Nibb]

Yes....no problem.

[cyprus]

I win

[matieboy]

hi mate, when you installed win7 why didnt you just format the hard drive and delete any partitions then you will get a clean install,did you select custom install or upgrade? dont bother with upgrade, then you get the chance to format your drive, I believe the windows.old files are if you decide to revert back to a previous windows installation.

[Nibb]

No it gives u the option of keeping ur old install files!

Even if u do an OS reinstall

[DejaVu]

Upgradings rubbish.
Leaves lots of Vista crap behind. I would have clean installed too, backed up what I wanted then deleted the partition and formatted afresh.

[Nibb]

What if u have to reinstall Win 7??

[Bilbo_baggin]

Thanks for the arguments guys

Hehehe!


I can't remember exactly what I did, but I was using Windows XP, so as far as I recall, it was a format during install, as W7 cannot upgrade from XP, am I right?


So I followed the instructions and it must have created this windows.old folder itself as part of the process. The reason I haven't deleted it yet, is I wasn't sure if W7 was accessing it for anything.


Bilbo.

[Mickey]

As always backup your main doc folders and things to a USB or spare drive and install a fresh copy of win7. once fully installed copy back the important stuff and do a backup

DOH
And yes you can delete the old folder as well as some that get put in the windows folder after the install process (all the junk in the windows/temp folder for instance)