Hard Drive slowly losing space

I was surfing the net one day when a message popped up telling me i needed a disk cleanup because i was running out of HD space, i knew i had at least 30 gb left, but when i checked it was at 167mb left, i closed and reopened a new window and it was at 154 mb left

I have tried a system restore, and deleted a few major folders i found i could always recover another time just to empty up some room as well as i did a system restore. I believe it has either stopped or slowed down the depletion, but i still cant recover that space or figure out what was making me lose so much space that quickly

Windows Vista
250gb HD
Missing at least 30 gb of memory that I cannot find

...Also when looking at the HD on my computer, says i have about 30 gb left (after deleting the folders) but once i double click OS (C:) and highlight all folders and click properties, it tells me i have at least 60 left

Im losing about 500mb within 10 minutes, and i dont know wat to do! (I was considering restarting from scratch but i do not wan't to resort to that)

HELP WOULD BE GREATLY APPRECIATED

It sounds as though you may not be taking into account the hidden files and folders and hidden protectected operating system files.
These can take up a considerable amount of disk space. You can try going to Control Panel/Folder Options and clicking on the "View" tab, then scroll down and untick the radio button for "do not show hidden files & folders" and untick "hiide protected operating system files" .... this will then show, when you explore the drive, but I have never known anyone to get an accurate size doing things this way. -- remember to change them back, when done.

If you right click the drive in "Computer" and select Properties .... this is the more accurate way of determining what space is used/available.

When I right click the drive in "computer" and select properties it tells me i have 30gb left after deletion of the major folders i didnt need, but i know in fact that i have at least 60gb as I didn't store anything new on my computer during this whole week, so I do not know wat has happened

I will once again try looking through the hidden system files...I have already done that to see what has been causing the problem, but I guess i might need to search deeper, thanks though..

Silly question maybe, but have you emptied the recycle bin ?

I was thinking that too Phil. Also try opening up the disk manager and check the whole disk is allocated as a partition. start>control pannel>admin tools>computer management>disk management.

Run Ccleaner, it automatically cleans all the junk and temp files and rubbish up, I've freed up many GB's on some machines.

http://www.ccleaner.com/download/downloading

Download AMUST Disk Cleaner and look for large folders.

Phil, yes i have emptied my recycling bin, and I will try to download this cleaners see if it helps, but i'm not sure if u are understanding my problem here

it is not that i dont have enough space on my computer because of junk or somethin, it is that im slowly losing space, without doing anything on my computer, like some file or something is expanding by itself and I cannot find it or I don't know wats going on,

My hardrive is gradually losing space by itself, when i left my computer alone for half an hour i lost over a gb of memory...from idleness which is what i don't understand

currently im on a different computer so that my hardrive space doesnt reach zero

but i will try the programs for cleaning my computer thank you for the suggestions, in the position im in, I need all the help i can get

OK .... there are a couple of Windows operations that use HDD space automatically.
The first is Virtual Memory, whereby Windows reserves HDD space as Ram .... this is an automatic process and is in constant use by the system. The default size is 1.5 x the amount of Ram installed. Have a look here for more details : http://support.microsoft.com/kb/555223

The second is System Restore, which again is an automatic process and reserves, by default 12% of the capacity of your HDD.

If HDD space gets very low, Windows automatically suspends these operations, but when HDD space is freed up, they will resume, which may explain your experience.
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/300044

phil, both operations are good suggestions, but i highly doubt system restore and virtual memory would suck up over 30gb of my space, i read up on both those articles thanks for that , and i did get that message that popped up about not having alot of space and to run disk cleanup, but nothing about a system restore then, and when i checked, i was at 167mb or something close to that, and yet the number was still dropping, which would leave system restore out of the question cuz it needs at least 200 mb of space to run, as well as again, it wouldnt need 30gb+ of my hard drive space to run

....im beginning to think this could be some sort of virus and i have yet to try those cleaners mentioned but i also believe its just for cleaning up space on my computer, and not finding what is causing my hard drive space to drop so quickly automatically..

thanks to everyone so far... still no solution tho =(

I notice your HDD is 250gb and System Restore uses/reserves 12% of your HDD capacity.
12% of 250 = 30, which seems coincidental.

If you turn off System Restore, it will remove all the restore points, freeing up the HDD space, then reboot and recheck, to see if you gain back space.

Dont forget to switch it on again and create a Restore Point, just in case there are future issues.

I think that might have done it but now I am just confused
I have had my computer for almost a year now and never have i experienced something like this. I regained all my missing space after the turning of system restore and deleting all old restore points.

What is confusing me though, is why did I lose up to the 12% of HD space within maybe a couple of days? wouldnt it be taking a bit of space throughout the whole year? not all of the 12% (30gb+) in just a few days?

By the way, thank you phil for helping I think that has done the trick, but i still need to understand maybe why it did all this all so suddenly... I thought I had a virus or something

You're welcome ..... glad it has resolved things a little.

System Restore actively monitors what you are doing and is constantly creating Restore Points, sometimes more than one a day .... for example, restore points are created before new device drivers, automatic updates, unsigned drivers, and some applications are installed. These healthy system checkpoints are created without prompting or intervention from the user the first time the computer is started after Windows XP is installed and, by default, on a daily basis after that. You can also manually create restore points.

There's a bit more detail here, that may give you a better understanding

One other point I should have mentioned ..... you can safely reduce the amount of space reserved for System Restore. If you bear in mind that XP is 8 years old now and was written when HDDs were much smaller than today. Therefore 12% of a 30gb HDD would have been 3,6gb.
If you are low on space, you could easily reduce the allocated space in System Restore settings ... just drag the slider back to maybe 4% = 10gb

thanks alot phil for everything, ill try to find that slider you were talking about to reduce the percentage of hard drive space it uses up, but then again i dont noe the advantages or disadvantages of that, ill read up on the system restore article im sure it will clear things up

once again, thanks alot for the help