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I've my Dell G5 5590 for about 11 months now, it came with RTX 2060, i7 9750h, 16 gigs ram, 1TB HDD, and 128 GB M2 SSD. My SSD has run outta space now and I didn't even install anything in the OS drive. So now I'm planning to do a fresh install of windows. So I wanted to know if there are any risk factors in doing so in a laptop that came with a pre-installed copy of windows. What programs would I need to reinstall after windows installation? Will my SSD be detectable when I chose to install a new copy of windows? and any other things which I should consider before going with it. Thank you.

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  • Why not just clone the SSD to something that's not comedically small?
    – Tetsujin
    Apr 30, 2021 at 17:48

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Windows is profligate in use of drive space. During an update, it may be using almost triple the amount taken up by the Windows OS directory itself: The original Windows folder, the update files that are downloaded and unpacked, and a copy of the Windows folder, Windows.old. Perhaps investigate purchase of a larger SSD, or experiment with an OS that uses space more efficiently, e.g. Linux.

However, the first task is to make an image of all disk drives, and verify that the images are valid. There are a number of applications, such as Macrium Reflect Free, to perform that imaging. With complete disk images, you should be able to recover from any error in reinstallation.

Then, investigate moving non-system folders, e.g., Documents, Music, Photos and Videos, to the larger, though slower, HDD. Keep Windows OS on the SSD for speed.

Make an inventory of all applications on your system. KC Softwares' Sumo might be helpful (note that the Zip version does not install adware, nor require any installation at all). Then you can decide what to keep and what is bloatware.

Finally, during reinatallation, you can decide to keep all your files or start over from scratch.

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  • thank you, helps a lot, but I am mainly concerned about dell specific programs, do i need to have em all like alienware control center and other support programs?
    – Hassan Zia
    Apr 26, 2021 at 0:15
  • I can confirm Macrium reflect is miracle software.
    – Salocor
    Apr 26, 2021 at 5:00
  • As for specific programs, you'd have to research each to see if you might use it now or in the future. One reason to make disk images is that a mistake would not be fatal - you can always recover should you remove a needed file. See listoffreeware.com/best-free-bloatware-remover-for-windows , for example, for tools to remove unneeded apps.
    – DrMoishe Pippik
    Apr 26, 2021 at 18:47

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