Why can't I upgrade XP on my hard drive?

I went to Windows XP Home Page & proceeded to download the Service Pack 1 for my XP. However after a long time of downloading it told me that it was unable to proceed for lack of space. I knew that I had 786MB spare space, but when I looked again after this message came up I was down to 360MB! Any idea what happened to the other 400 odd MB? And how the devil do I get that memory back when I don't know what took it? Is it possible that the downloading update is in my computerr somewhere & I can go delete it? I tried add/removing updates listed in the Add/Remove file & it told me if I took this file out some programs won't run. Can I in fact take these files out without killing my computer?

Many thanks for any assistance,

Shirley

This question was answered on December 16, 2002. Much of the information contained herein may have changed since posting.

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That's not memory, it's storage space, and your hard drive is out of it.

Windows XP updates are indeed large XP itself is indeed large

Once installed, your update would have relinquished some of that storage, but with a 4 GB drive, the PC has been barely slipping by on system requirements, taking into account other programs installed.

Therefore, the only real solution is a larger hard drive

A good rule of thumb is when the "properties" pie chart under Explorer shows a drive which is two thirds full, thoughts should turn to more storage.

RG

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Posted by Robert of Mesa Community College on December 16, 2002

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