Best Free Disk Space Analyzer
When your hard drive fills up, the quickest way to find out which files are hogging the space is to use a specialist utility that displays your disk space usage visually.
There are a number of excellent free contenders that differ mainly in the way the disk space usage is portrayed:
SequoiaView displays the space usage in a pretty manner using a technique called "Squarified treemaps".
The open source program WinDirStat uses just ordinary rectangular treemaps not squarified. It also offers a regular directory listing as well a summary chart showing usage by file type.
But now there's a new contender called TreePie, "a simple software to understand what fill your HD". Basically, TreePie represents disk usage like a pizza with the size of each slice representing the space taken by each top level folder. Clicking a folder "slice" will then display a similar "pizza" breakdown of the sub-folders and files in that folder. It sounds complicated when I describe it but it's simple and intuitive in use.
It's also highly effective. Add to that the fact that it's also portable, has an alternative Windows explorer view and is free open source software and you have an easy "top product in class" recommendation.
My only complaint is its rather slow scan time. Still, this is not the kind of program you will be using everyday so a short delay is quite tolerable.
Product Details
SequoiaView
Website: http://www.win.tue.nl/sequoiaview/
Download page: http://www.download.com/SequoiaView/3000-2248_4-10628998.html
Author:
Date: 12/19/2002
Version: 1.3
Download File size: 554KB
License:
Operating systems supported: Windows 95/98/ME/NT4/2000/XP
64 Bit Capable: n/a
Portable version available: Unknown
Other languages supported:
Additional software required:
Other Relevent Information: None
WinDirStat
Website: http://windirstat.sourceforge.net/
Download page: http://downloads.sourceforge.net/windirstat
Author:
Date: 09/02/2007
Version: 1.1.2
Download File size: 645KB
License: GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
Operating systems supported: Windows 95/98/ME/NT4/2000/XP/2003/Vista
64 Bit Capable: n/a
Portable version available: no
Other languages supported: yes
Additional software required:
Website: http://treepieblog.blogspot.com/
Download page: http://downloads.sourceforge.net/treepie/TREEPIE1.2.zip?modtime=1209577352&big_mirror=0
Author: Marco Borgna
Date: 04/13/2008
Version: 1.2
Download File size: 170KB
License: BSD License `
Operating systems supported: Windows 95/98/ME/NT4/2000/XP
64 Bit Capable: n/a
Portable version available: no
Other languages supported: yes
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The newer versions of windirstat allow to choose rectangular or squarified maps.
its clearly the best one IMO. Great, useful little app
-J
Scanner
http://www.steffengerlach.de/freeware/
This tool uses a unique concentric pie chart to display the usage of your hard disk or other media. The chart shows all major files and folders from all directory levels at once.
This is the best I've ever seen, think You should consider it and keep up with this great site. Hope I've helped.
Andre' Carvalho
I use SpaceMonger. It shows things as rectangles inside rectangles and shows as much as possible without needing to zoom in on folders. But you can easily zoom in to see more details.
I use diskdata
http://www.diskdata.com/download/diskdata.exe
Diskdata is NOT freeware. Durr.
Thank you for your help, i found this page searching "SPACE ANALYZER OPEN SOURCE WINDOWS" on google and fortunately i found what I was looking for. :)
--greenkey
I like to use fosi++ . There is a lite version which is freeware.
treesize free ver 2x www.jam-software.com
I haven't found anything I like better than Overdisk --especially with the "Rainbow Wash" visual setting. It makes disk usage very clear visually.
Agree. Can´t understand why people like the "box view". It´s a total mess. OverDisk´s visualization (similar to Scanner and TreePie) is much clearer.
have use Disc\kTective for years , excellent and self-contained so can run from an USB facility (www.disktective.com/)
No folder size there...
Here's 2 more:
Xinorbis - http://www.freshney.org/xinorbis/index.htm
HDGraph - http://hdgraph.objectis.net/
Might be interesting to provide a "winner" in each of 3 categories:
- Treemap-view
- Pie-chart-view
- Exportable reports
Also might be interesting to have a new category for "getneral data exploration/visualization".
Panopticon also used to offer a generalized treemapper with disk space as a default source... it was very nice but I can't find the freeware version of it anymore.
Download links for both Sequoia View and WinDirStat currently point tot he incorrect location of "http://downloads.sourceforge.net/inkscape/Inkscape-0.46.win32.exe" (Inkscape - a vector graphics editor). The text shown on the links is correct, but the code for the links is pointing to the erroneous location.
Thanks. Hopefully fixed.
+1 for treesize free
Hello Mike Norris{editor}
I recently tried to download some suggestions from your software page. The first being Amust, warning that the site was corrupt and Sequoia download was a alert of a potentially malicious program. Are these download sites that insecure or I'm I just unlucky. Thanks still for a great web site.
I can't remember where I first got the recommendation, but I've been using the last free version of Spacemonger (http://www.sixty-five.cc/sm/v1x.php) ever since I first found it. Extremely quick and gives a nice graphical representation of what's eating the space on your HD.
I like WinDirStat.
It has both a directory listing and graphical blocks display, with colors for different file types.
http://windirstat.info/
+1.
I loved Sequoia and used it quite abit and I do prefer the squarified treemap it uses. But windirstat is more useful to me because of the multiple views. BTW you can make sequoia portable (and many other apps) by using uniextract.
J
Although TreeSize Free is an excellent basic disk space analyser, I prefer WinDirStat because it combines the best of both a graphical diskmap as well as a hierarchical tree map.
It is also extremely small and easy to use; and best of all, it also has a portable version at http://portableapps.com/
I have been using a freeware app called Overdisk for a few years now on XP. The author says its a beta at V0.11 but Ive never had a problem with it and cant fault it.
It uses an intuitive pie chart type representation of diskspace very similar to Treepie, but is far easier to use and provides more feedback and information with a professional looking GUI. I recently used it to find that extensions language files were wasting a load of space in my portable firefox 'installation'.
You can find it on the authors website here : http://users.forthnet.gr/pat/efotinis/programs/overdisk.html
I use JDiskReport as my preferred tool. Its a java based app and needs installing, but it is a very professional tool with plenty of options and is still being maintained and developed at my last check.
http://www.jgoodies.com/freeware/jdiskreport/
Providing much the same display as Treepie, Stefan Gerlach's Scanner is a far superior product. It is faster and more colourful with a lot more functionality. I have been using this for a few years now and it is absolutely the easiest way of tracking down wasted disk usage. URL: http://www.steffengerlach.de/freeware/
Yes! I was searching google for ages trying to remember what Stefan Gerlach's program was called - Scanner.
It's the best disk disk management program I have ever used. I installed it on my old PC and spent ages looking for it for my new PC, and found it in your comment.
It's good because
1) It's a standalone exe
2) Lets you easily add context menu shortcuts for scanning folders
3) Simple and easy to use, no pointless extra features that you don't need.
Thanks mate. And thanks Stefan!
I too swear by Scanner by Stefan Gerlach: it's simple to use, very revealing and ergonomic - and you don't even have to install it!
bearing in mind it is several years old, i don't understand why in this :visual: era there's so little visual applications like this one...
I use Treesize (free) for more than 10 years (probably more).
It is simple and effective. Try it out.
http://www.jam-software.com/freeware/index.shtml
I agree, TreeSize Free is probably the best basic disk space analyser there is. It provides all the necessary information, is small and fast and does the job very well indeed!
FolderSize. All you need; without the need to interpret goofy boxes. Format you are already used to too.
http://foldersize.sourceforge.net/about.html
None of the tools listed shows you the System Volume Information which in many cases can take up a great deal of disk space. ExplorerXP and Amust Disk cleaner shows everything.
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