Free Up Hibernate Space on SSD

**shatter99** · 12-09-11, 11:41 PM

So here I am trying to free up space on my 60GB SSD so I can move BF3 to it and what did WinDirStat reveal..

A hidden hibernate file eating up 16GB of space on the SSD. Buried deep and away from prying eyes.

So it you do not care for a PC that sleeps (hibernates) open a command prompt in admin mode and enter

powercfg -h off

at the command prompt. That will turn sleep (hibernate) mode off and free up some space from you SSD. That file typically equals your total ram.

link to the article.. and yes.. I found it exactly as they describe in the 1st sentence..

What is hiberfil.sys and How Do I Delete It? - How-To Geek

**RhysJD3** · 12-10-11, 09:16 AM

I also read an article about turn on compression. Very little speed lose but you get back a fair amount of space. Freeing Up Capacity On An SSD With NTFS Compression : More SSD Capacity Through NTFS Compression

**rush2049** · 12-10-11, 02:35 PM

The only way to 'delete' that file is to disable hibernation on your computer. If you don't use it, or would rather have the space then use hibernation do the following:

Click Start, and then type cmd in the Start Search box.
In the search results list, right-click Command Prompt, and then click Run as Administrator.
When you are prompted by User Account Control, click Continue.
At the command prompt, type powercfg.exe /hibernate off, and then press ENTER.
Type exit and then press ENTER to close the Command Prompt window.

Source: How to disable and re-enable hibernation on a computer that is running Windows

Also if you are using an SSD, I hope you have your pagefile moved to a second drive and not on the SSD itself..........

**kibner** · 12-10-11, 03:14 PM

If you have an Intel drive, they have a SSD Toolbox that will optimuze some configuration options in Windows for your SSD. I don't know what it changes, though. It also allows you to do a manual trim.

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**shatter99** · 12-10-11, 06:21 PM

USE AT YOUR OWN RISK

Found another SSD space saver:

Move your C:\Windows\Installer directory to free up disk space (mine was 8GB)

Download and install something small that uses the Windows installer (you want to test the uninstall process after you to do this to make sure uninstalls works correctly). Examine the log and make sure it did not encounter any errors durnig the file copy process. DOUBLE CHECK that you selected to VERIFY and COPY ACL's <- CRITICAL

Use FastCopy (FastCopy) to copy the contents of C:\Windows\Installer to D:\Windows\Installer. Select the Verify and Copy ACL options.

Rename your existing C:\Windows\Installer to C:\Windows\Installer.old (it is a system directory so it is hidden)
Open command prompt and enter the follow:
mklink C:\Windows\Installer D:\Windows\Installer /J

Now enter
dir C:\Windows\Installer

It should scroll through a list of files. If it does, then the direction junction worked and as far as windows is concerned nothing has changed.

No go uninstall something. If it works, you can delete C:\Windows\Installer.old.

Enjoy your recovery of disk space on your SSD.

**shatter99** · 12-10-11, 06:22 PM

yes... mklink C:\Windows\Installer D:\Windows\Installer /J is in the correct order.. the directory with the REAL files is the 2nd argument...

**WileECyte** · 12-12-11, 10:28 AM

You can't move the hibernation file. There's some technical reasons why it can't be moved, so your only option is to disable hibernation. With boot times being what they are on SSDs... hibernation mode is less useful anyways.

Reason hiberfil.sys cannot be moved:

Windows Confidential: The File System Paradox

**blackgold** · 12-12-11, 10:42 AM

yep wilee.. interesting article.. going to boot up both ways today to decide whether or not to disable hibernation..
Brian

**WileECyte** · 12-12-11, 10:45 AM

The ONLY thing hibernation buys you is all the apps you have running, come back up in the same state they were in hibernation. Most of my apps that I'd want to resume on startup (like web browser) have their own ability to restore to their previous state.

**blackgold** · 12-12-11, 11:01 AM

Just did a test, took 23.9 seconds to boot in to hybernated state, took 20.5 seconds to cold boot.. I guess I'm deleting it. I don't care much for restoring everything. It is only 3 gigs on the laptop but is nearly 16 on my desktop.
Brian