Summary: Many manufacturers create a recovery drive or partition on your hard disk. Windows may warn you about low disk space on it. I'll look at wWhat to do?
I have HP vista pavilion, running home premium (about 6 months old). The computer displayed a low memory on drive "D" recovery. I stayed on the phone with a tech rep two hours trying to get this explained. Showed I had not done a "backup". Of all the computers I have used I have never received this notification. The tech set my computer to do backup every month. Is this a "must"? Was instructed to insert a disc every first of the month. What is the purpose of doing this and is it necessary? As to the disk, what kind should I use?
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There are several misunderstandings in this question, and it sounds like the support technician certainly didn't help. But the misunderstandings are so common that I really wanted to take an opportunity to clear them up if I can.
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First, a disk drive does not run low on memory, it runs out of space. Yes, while disks can be used to "remember" things - a kind of memory I suppose - when applied to computers the term memory specifically refers to the RAM memory installed in your computer. Hard disks are something else entirely.
I know it sounds like I'm being very nit-picky, and I suppose I am. The problem is that particularly when it comes to computers, using the correct terminology is extremely important. For example, if you tell a technician that you think you're running out of memory when you really mean that you're running out of disk space then it's likely that you're not going to get the help you need to fix your problem.
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Secondly, if drive "D" has been set up as a recovery drive (which is quite common these days), you should simply never use it. Period. You would use it only as part of actually performing a recovery.
Now, there may be some confusion since Windows may start warning you that the drive is close to full. Well, a recovery drive D will almost always be close to full, and that's ok. It has a bunch of recovery information on it and it doesn't need any more room because you should never use it for anything else. As long as you're not using it for anything else, you can simply ignore the low space warnings for a recovery drive.
The one caveat I'll throw out here is that if you are using your recovery drive for something, you may quickly run out of space on the drive and some programs may fail to work or complete their tasks properly. I have no way of knowing if that's the case on your system, but it's something to keep an eye on. If you experience failures in certain programs, make sure that they're not saving files to your recovery drive.
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Lastly, I have no idea how or why backing up came into your conversation. Backing up isn't related to anything we've discussed so far.
That being said, the technician is correct: everyone should backup regularly, or you are at risk of losing all of the information on your computer. Occasionally things break, and when they break occasionally all the data on your computer will be lost. It really is that simple.
So yes, in my opinion, backing up is a must.
Backing up is more than just putting a disk in your computer once a month. It does require that you run backup software of some sort, and that the software is configured to properly copy the data you care about to some location that is not on your computer: a CD or DVD, an external hard drive, another computer that's on your local network, whatever works for you. Exactly what you'll need will depend on the kind of backup program you'd run and how much effort you want to put into it. I typically recommend getting an external hard drive and software that backs up automatically for you every night.
My previous article What backup program should I use? has more information on backing up.
My guess is that the technician mentioned backing up not as a solution to any problem you might be experiencing, but simply because it is important and could help you recover from more serious problems you might experience in the future.
Related:
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Ask Leo! - What backup program should I use?
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Ask Leo! - Where's my disk space going? (Also has a better description of the difference between memory and disk space.)
Article C3247 - December 24, 2007
Leo, I am a research specialist of HP working on HP desktop issues. You gotta check this link. The tech must not have misunderstood the customer, though he used the wrong term as memory. He has set up the back up only for the convenience of the customer. The D drive runs outta space, only because, the back up files of vista get stored over there, by default. we need to delete the baked up files and change the back up path to fix the issue, though setting up back up is entirely up to the user. Please refer to this link for more and detailed info.
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/genericDocument?docname=c00859515&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en&jumpid=reg_R1002_USEN#N350
Cheers!
Posted by: Sandeep Sarangi at April 21, 2008 7:22 PMSandeep
I went to programs and removed drive (d) i have had no probs since doing this my laptop is an HP COMPAQ 6720S
Posted by: ROSS at May 20, 2008 5:19 AMIf you remove drive (d) please make shore you have your back up disks as you can not use f11 no more then you can allways restore if you want
Posted by: ROSS at May 20, 2008 5:27 AMI DID A FORMAT OF DRIVE (D) IT SEEMS TO WORK OK SO I CAN STILL USE F11 AND RESTORE NOW . WINDOWS IS ON C .I did this in the end .As long as you have your disks you are safe to try
Posted by: ross at May 20, 2008 4:41 PMhi i brought a philips 512MB, i put my songs on then after a while i deleted them all so i can put new ones on ive tried puttin new ones on and i only have 443MB and there are no songs on the mp3.
Posted by: Liam at June 23, 2008 6:25 AMHey, I recently bought a Hp labtop its a Pavilion entertainment pc and so I was wondering if it is safe to delete some files/stuff on the recovery drive to clear up space since it says its full and which files can I delete so that it doesn't affect my main drive. Last time I tried it I ended up losing my recent files.
Posted by: Altec at September 3, 2008 6:57 AMhow do i get files from the d: recovery drive i can't get into it
Posted by: john c at October 26, 2008 3:05 PMJust finished with a live chat with an HP Tech Support guy, he recommend this action and it worked for me:
1. Click on Start and then Run
2. Type regedit and click OK
3. Click on the File menu and click Export
4. Type the filename as regbackup and Save the file to your Desktop.
From the Registry window,
1. Click on the '+' sign next to HKEY_CURRENT_USER
2. Click on the '+' sign next to SOFTWARE
3. Click on the '+' sign next to Microsoft
4. Click on the '+' sign next to Windows
5. Click on the '+' sign next to CurrentVersion
6. Click on the '+' sign next to Policies
7. Click on the '+' sign next to Explorer
8. Highlight Explorer
9. Click On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value.
10. Type NoLowDiskSpaceChecks and then press ENTER.
11. On the Edit menu, click Modify.
12. Type 1 and then click OK.
Restart the computer for the changes to take effect.
You'll no longer get the message about low disk space again.
Hope it helps,
Cheers
Posted by: Alex at December 9, 2008 12:24 PMGoing to the regedit and editing does not work. I did it several different ways and none work. I have not try adding more space on the "D" drive. I would like to back up the recovery drive on a flash drive and get rid of the "D" drive. Is that possible?
Posted by: Joe at February 4, 2009 6:16 PMlow memory on my D recovery drive -- (Vista) --Solution.Is to clear memory hoard 9.9 G.B 0f unnecessary junk. Yet how is it done ?
Posted by: pat moore at October 4, 2009 12:40 AM