How to reduce the amount of space used by Vistas’ System Restore Points.
Because Vista will not allow you to delete all previous system restore points other than the last one created (as with XP), this can only be done by turning off System Restore then turning it back on again which will then remove
ALL restore points.
Vistas' default is set to use 15% of a hard-drive’s space for it’s Restore Points.
So if you have a 180GB drive that means 27GB is used for this purpose - far, far too much in my opinion, I believe it is totally unnecessary to have 20 to 30+ restore points that Vista will create, but more like six or seven restore points should suffice.
Unlike Windows XP, Vista does not have a slider control to change the amount of space allocated, but it can be done with a very easy registry change.
To reduce the amount of restore points to six or seven (or however many you chose) can only be achieved by trial and error with altering the value in the registry because the amount of restore points is determined by the amount of programs and data that is stored on the HDD/s.
To change this value, click Start, followed by:
“All Programs, Accessories and then Run”
Now in the Run box type regedit and click OK.
When the registry opens select and click:
" HKLM (HKEY LOCAL MACHINE) " in the left hand column, then,
" Software/Microsoft/Windows NT/Current Version/System Restore "
Select and expand System Restore and click on:
" cfg " then, Right click on " Disc Percent " (on right of page) then click on Modify and make sure a spot is placed in the small circle next to Decimal. Now change the value in the Value Data Box from 15 to 5 (or whatever you chose) then click OK to close. Now close the registry.
In this example System Restore will now occupy only 9GB (5%) of your hard-drive space.
By monitoring over the next few days you will get to see how many restore points are now being created, so you can then decide if this is acceptable or not.
(Simply go to System Restore and select “Restore my Computer to an earlier date” and count how many restore points there are.
WARNING: Before carrying out any alterations to the registry make sure you have made a backup.
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