Simon Hughes - Software Architect, Tutor, Developer

I setup a Virtual PC recently and noticed my hard disks were very busy lately. My VirtualPC is not on, but checking what files were being accessed (Task Manager --> Performance --> Resource monitor) I noticed that the VHD virtual disk image was being read a lot. Which is really odd as it's not in use. The solution was to disble the service "Superfetch". Hey presto, all is quiet again. Superfetch was trying to keep my system running fast by pre-loading the VHD into memory. Madness. I've had superfetch turned off all day, and my hard disks's have never been so quiet. Wonderful. Now, if only there was a way to exclude folders from superfetch... Having a Google around there's no exclusion list, however, there is a way to refine what's going on via the registry key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Memory Management\PrefetchParameters Modify the EnablePrefetcher key to one of the following settings: Disa...

If you use Virtual PC 2007 you know that the virtual hard drive files (.VHDs) can grow to extremely large sizes. The .VHD files dynamically expand when software is installed in the .VHD. After installation, the original setup files are deleted and no longer take up space in the .VHD. However the .VHD does not correspondingly dynamically shrink in size. Once a .VHD file expands - it doesn't shrink. EXAMPLE: If the installation of a product uses 500MB to expand its setup files and only really consumes 200MB in the "C:\Program Files\" directory, the .VHD file expands accordingly. When the 500MB of setup files are subsequently deleted after installation has completed, the .VHD file doesn't shrink afterwards. That is wasted host storage. So the question is: How do I shrink the size of a .VHD when I know it's inflated unnecessarily? Here's how to do it: Clear out the machine of filler Install ccleaner from http://ccleaner.com   which deletes all t...