I was having problems with my pc storage space sometime ago. So basically i need to  go over all the files i have in my pc and have a hard time condescending which files/folders to delete to free up space. So i decided to analyze in which directory i should start. So in my perspective i cannot recursively go down each directory just to find which eats up most space. So i used WinDirStat  to check disk usage.

After scanning your system, WinDirStat shows you exactly which folders, file types, and files are using the most space. Ensure you don’t delete any important system files – only delete personal data files. If you see a program’s folder in the Program Files folder using a large amount of space, you can uninstall that program – WinDirStat can tell you just how much space a program is using, even if the Programs and Features Control Panel doesn’t.

windirstat

 

Definition:

Download WinDirStat here

WinDirStat is a disk usage statistics viewer and cleanup tool for various versions of Microsoft Windows.
Note: if you are looking for an alternative for Linux, you are looking for KDirStat (apt-get install kdirstat on Debian-derivatives) and for MacOS X it would be Disk Inventory X or GrandPerspective.

So now i know which directories to move forward too. I browsed the contents to check. I found out that there are duplicate files in these different locations/folders but it would take weeks before i finish manually searching for those duplicate files. Luckily i found this application that search, let’s you review and delete the duplicate files in your chosen directory.  The application’s name is dupeGuru.  But it would let you delete only 10 at a time for the free version, but if you want to do chosen action without any restrictions you need to purchase the full version.

dupeGuru

 

Definition:

Download dupeGuru here

dupeGuru is a tool to find duplicate files on your computer. It can scan either filenames or contents. The filename scan features a fuzzy matching algorithm that can find duplicate filenames even when they are not exactly the same. dupeGuru runs on Windows, Mac OS X and Linux.

Features

dupeGuru is efficient.

Find your duplicate files in minutes, thanks to its quick fuzzy matching algorithm. dupeGuru not only finds filenames that are the same, but it also finds similar filenames.

dupeGuru is customizable.

You can tweak its matching engine to find exactly the kind of duplicates you want to find. The Preference page of the help file lists all the scanning engine settings you can change.

dupeGuru is safe.

Its engine has been especially designed with safety in mind. Its reference directory system as well as its grouping system prevent you from deleting files you didn’t mean to delete.

Do whatever you want with your duplicates.

Not only can you delete duplicates files dupeGuru finds, but you can also move or copy them elsewhere. There are also multiple ways to filter and sort your results to easily weed out false duplicates (for low threshold scans).

Supported languages:

English, French, German, Chinese (Simplified), Czech, Italian, Armenian, Russian, Ukrainian, Brazilian.

After doing some clean up using the applications above a whopping 35 G was been added to my free space. That’s really something. Try it yourself! Have a happy time cleaning your pc.