Vista SP2: Readers Report Big Jumps in Free Disk Space

Windows Vista Service Pack 2 went final earlier this week, with numerous fixes and tweaks to improve performance, bolster security, and squash bugs. But some PC World readers are seeing another welcome change to SP2: a lot more free disk space.

In comments posted in our forums, several readers reported large increases in free hard disk space after installing Vista SP2. Mind you, I'm not talking about a gigabyte here or there; one reader claimed that installing Vista SP2 freed up a massive 40 GB chunk of disk space. Another reader said, "Wow! I didn't notice that til now. I went from about 88GB free to 122GB free. That's a significant change 'under the hood,' isn't it?" And yet another reader gained back 130 GB of hard disk space. Wow.

At least a couple users told me that their free space grew significantly after installing SP2, without them doing anything else. Vista SP2 includes a command-line cleanup tool (compcln.exe) you can run to remove older system files and restore points, thus freeing up hard disk space.

My assumption is that the Vista SP2 installer automatically runs compcln.exe, but we have yet to receive an official explanation from Microsoft. Once we do, though, I'll pass it along. Obviously your milage may vary depending on your system, but I think it's safe to say that most everyone will welcome more free disk space.

If you're running Vista SP2, we'd love to hear from you. Tell us your SP2 experiences--good and bad--by following us on Twitter, at @pcworld, and shoot us a tweet.