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The standard Windows 8 Surface tablets came in for some stick, thanks to the Windows files eating up 13GB of hard drive space. That’s nothing compared to Windows 8 Pro, which requires an astonishing 45GB of the Surface Pro’s disk space for its files.
The numbers, obtained from Microsoft by Softpedia, would make an absolute mockery of the 64GB version of the Surface Pro tablet if replicated there, with the machine possibly only having 19GB of space for users to use if Windows 8 eats up a similar chunk of drive space on the more affordable Pro option. [Softpedia via T3]
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45GB!! fuck me, I would have thought 15GB max for the OS/Files,
What is included in the 45GB? Office, Games?, Media Players, Maps?
I believe around 18GB of the space is saved for refresh / restore.
Ah right, still! Cloud based restore?
for a 15gb download? rather not.
surely you could just stick it on a USB key or something?
Why is it 15GB anyway? surley it should just save your settings and contacts and important shit, upload the pics to the cloud and other stuff if you want to, I would rather have an extra 18GB on my drive.
A form of Verified boot maybe?
It’s the way Win8 is designed – They’ve gone one step further than System Restore and you can ‘Refresh’ your device.
It wipes out everything but your personal data, and returns you to the state you were in following first install. For a device like Surface Pro where you have the power to tinker, install and generally wreck the device, but no easy means to reinstall the OS, it’s ideal. Granted they could have applied some compression, but still better than nothing.
Given the availability of massive amounts USB storage in flash-drive form, and the USB 3.0 ports on Surface Pro, I think I’d rather have the backup on the device!
Can the Pro still boot from USB like a normal desktop?
I assume so, but I’d still rather have the image on the device.
you would still need the full OS on the system in a hidden partition. just having files etc backed up is a different thing to having the OS available for when it goes tits up.
In that case, can I do a full wipe on the device and install the desktop version of Windows 8?
Space is also required for the swap file. Office is not included with the Surface Pro.
15GB for 32bit / 20GB for 64bit Clean install requirements.
Add your pagefile, hibernate file, restore/recovery partition, and additional software that may have been installed, that may explain the 36GB space used! How?
128Gib (means ~128×10^9 bytes) => ~119GB (128×10^9 / 1024^3)
119 – 83 = 36 GB (space used for software+recovery+page file+hibernate?)
Also to consider:
4GB RAM = 4GB Page File (RAM/PAGE = 1/1 unless changed)
4GB RAM = 3GB Hibernate File (RAM/HIBER = 4/3 HIBER)
So 20 GB clean install + 7GB RAM specific system created files = 27GB
that leaves 9GB for additional software+recovery)
Thanks, Clearly explains where all the memory goes, but they shouldn’t advertise it as 128GB
Agreed, but unfortunately, manufacturers are abusing the metric system in their benefit even though they are purposely and fraudulently using the GB where as they should be using GiB, as Gi as in Gibi and single G as in Giga!!!
There is a difference between the terms and its use! The use of the term is fraudulent but nobody as of yet sued any manufacturers yet. Manufacturers use a fine print to identify 10^9 mark like 1 GB saying 1.000.000.000 bytes… Despite this identification, still its use is wrong! GB means Gigabyte not GiB!
It is like saying a dozen of eggs, but with a fine print saying your dozen is consist of 10! And people sell things saying 10 dozens, which is 120 but because of personal use of dozen meaning it suddenly became 100!
It is a standards issue that-to many technically knowledged’s surprise- noone has yet sued these monkeys over the use of fraudulent use of abbreviation!
Disable hibernation. There’s little reason to hibernate when you are using flash memory.
You don’t need 1:1 RAM to Page File ratio. Windows default Page File is less than 1:1. You can set it to be bigger, but you are not going to see much performance improvement.
Yes you can do those steps to gain a bit more space, but I was only talking about the occupied space due to default settings.
However:
There is still reason for hibernation unless you figured out a way to change power draw under certain circumstances. But if you dont do use it, disable it your choice.
Windows default page size (unless you manually override) 1:1 and can increase over time! You can check it after a fresh install see what i mean. Hibernation file can change but max will be your memory size, but usually smaller.
Bear in mind, that with a 128GB hard drive only has around 120GB of actual usable space. You’re still losing 37GB, but I believe half is OS and half is restore.
Another point to remember is that unlike a certain competitor – the Surface will allow you to plug in USB mass storage devices and micro SD cards. So while you might not be able to fit all your movies on the device, you could store these on a USB drive or a micro SD card.
Ah, the cheapshot at apple. I’m only pissed cos you thought of it before me
Your name gives me the giggles.
Ha I thought no one would spot it yet
Don’t really use such expressions but ROFLCOPTER comes to mind.
So skinny yet so bloated.
hahahahaha!
Still buying one.
Good point – need to go and play with the non-Pro variant in John Lewis on Sat!
An Ultrabook is looking even more appealing right now, especially considering the Pro’s expected price.
With OSes become more bloated, it’s about time they started advertising “usable space”. So a 64Gb tablet gives you 64Gb to use (pre-formatted/metric notwithstanding)
With your use of the term Gb = Gigabit
we should be getting even worse! E.g 64 Gb, we should be getting 64/8 = 8 GB
What annoys me is that they should not be allowed to advertise it as a 128Gb model if 45Gb of it is unavailable to the user. Its false advertising from where I am sitting.
Does anyone know if you can just get rid of this massive amount of wasted space in system restore? Can you just turn it off and repartition it back into useable space?
According to the MS News site you can get rid of it and use the space
WOW.. again i think MS have underestimated the need to sweeten the market,
Apple, no matter what you think or say, have the tablet market and all future tablets will be compared to the ipad. The Ultrabook market is a little more spread, but between Mac book air and other PC brands, this tablet concept of an ultra book is a big step for a consumer to take and trust that it will cover all the needs and stuff a UB does. MS needed to make the deal sweet to win over these markets, price needed to be a little on the lower side to suck in the customers and get the word of mouth going, then it needed to make sure all specs ran and worked to the level it said they would. taking a third of the HDD for the OS will not help this in anyway to shift these units. they needed to have it so the OS once installed left 120GB for users. Covering these would have seen the Surface succeed and then the Surface2 start to have a stronger following for both RT and PRO.
It’s excessive. There’s nothing like a small SSD to make you appreciate hard disk space, but even Win7 only takes about 17gb by default, leaving you about 105GB left on a 128GB SSD. And that’s surprisingly useful for a reasonable set of apps and a few games.
Jesus Christ that’s hilarious! What a horrendous cock-up this has been for Microsoft. Absolute shambles!