Experience How to perform disk cleanup in the MS Windows operating system
using the built-in Disk Cleanup utility with its hidden parameters:
The MS Windows operating system includes a built-in "Disk Cleanup" tool designed to clean up hard drives and system components. This tool allows you to free up disk space by removing temporary files, system files, and other unnecessary items.
1. Start the WinTools.net program. In the main window of the program, click the "Cleanup" button in the menu on the right to launch the built-in Disk Cleanup utility. In the dialog box that appears for the "Disk Cleanup" utility, select the drive letter you want to clean and click "OK".
2. "Disk Cleanup" will calculate how much space can be freed up on the selected drive. In the "Files to delete" section, select the types of files you want to delete and click "OK". If you are not sure which files can be safely deleted, click on the file name, and a description of the file will appear at the bottom of the window.
3. If you want to free up even more disk space, restart the "Disk Cleanup" utility, select the drive letter, and click "OK". The utility will recalculate the potential space to be freed up. Then go to the "More Options" tab. Here you can clean up Programs and Components as well as Restore Points and Shadow Copies by clicking the respective "Clean up..." buttons for each item.
4. A little-known fact: the "Disk Cleanup" program has hidden settings and additional options for system cleanup. To access additional settings, launch the WinTools.net program
and go to the "System Tweaker" tool by clicking the "Tweak UI" button in the menu on the left. In the opened "System Tweaker" tool, go to the "System Fixer" tab. This tab contains additional features for working with the "Disk Cleanup" utility.
When you click the "Set Tasks" button, a list of hidden settings for the "Disk Cleanup" utility will appear. In the "Files to delete" list, check the hidden menu items you want to clean and click the "OK" button. Clicking the "OK" button in this case confirms the selected items but does not start the cleanup process. To start cleaning the selected items, click the "Run Tasks" button on the "System Fixer" tab.
5. In the "System Fixer" tab of the WinTools.net program, there is also a "Run on Very Low Disk" button designed to work with the "Disk Cleanup" utility. As the name implies, pressing it will launch the "Disk Cleanup" utility in automatic mode without a user interface and attempt to free up disk space using built-in methods, virtually bringing the system out of a critical state. This is especially useful if the free space on the disk is critically low and the system is experiencing difficulties. However, it should be remembered that using this function should be considered a last resort.
