What is Windows.old folder and How to Delete Windows.old

What is Windows.old folder?

After performing an upgrade or custom  installation of  windows 7,8 or vista, you might have seen a Windows.old folder in your C-Drive,this is because you haven't installed your Windows operating system without formatting the drive for a clean install and you have selected to install your windows on the same partition of the previous windows installation.

The Windows.old folder contains the copy of your previous windows installation and it is also possible that this folder is occupying approximate of 12 to 13 Giga's of your hard drive. And if you are already having a C:\Windows.old folder in your windows containing drive(mostly C drive) and then you perform an upgrade or custom installation then you will be having another C:\Windows.old folder and the previous windows  installation is renamed as C:\Windows.old.000





Note that the most recent installation will always be in the C:\Windows.old.

This article will show you how to delete the previous installation of windows generated during the installation of windows to save the hard disk space.

IMPORTANT NOTE: You must be logged on into your windows machine as an Administrator.

WARNINIG:  'Be sure to copy any file that you want from the Windows.old folder

How to delete Windows.old folder.

Once you are confirm that you no longer need any data from the folder windows.old then you may take the decision of deleting that particular folder and conserve your disk space.

Follow these steps to remove windows.old folder.

Step 1:
...
Click "Start" and then type "Disk Cleanup"

A pop up tab will be opened with the name " Disk Cleanup: Drive Selection"
Select your operating system containing disk and click "OK"

NOTE: You will not see this window unless you have more than one drive or partition on your computer.

Step 2:
...

Click on the "Clean up System Files" button (see screen shot)

If you are prompted for UAC then click/tap "yes".

Repeat the above steps again.

Step 3:
...

Click on the box "Previous windows installations " to check it.

Final step to click on "DELETE FILES".
It may takes several minutes to complete. when the Disk Cleanup finishes, the Windows.old folder will be deleted.

METHOD 2 : To delete using Command Prompt.

To delete the windows.old folder using command prompt, you first have to open the command prompt with administrator privileges, and then type the following :

RD /S /Q %SystemDrive%\Windows.old


NOTE:  If you have another windows.old.000 folder that you also want to delete then you can repeat the above command by substituting the name of Windows.old


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