Solved Folder WinSxS is too big on Windows 11 Pro, 23H2

Rahulji · Mar 14, 2024

Hi,
today I see that after March 2024 update my installation is much bigger.
I found that WinSxS is almost 15GB.

It is normall?

It is a fresh installation with 4 small apps.

Ghot · Mar 14, 2024

Rahulji said:
Hi,
today I see that after March 2024 update my installation is much bigger.
I found that WinSxS is almost 15GB.

It is normall?

It is a fresh installation with 4 small apps.

NO. That's too big.

Open a command prompt as admin, and type this command...

Dism.exe /online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup /ResetBase

Here's the full tutorial... works for Win 10 and Win 11...

Clean Up Component Store (WinSxS folder) in Windows 10

How to Clean Up Component Store (WinSxS folder) in Windows 10

www.tenforums.com

Bree · Mar 14, 2024

Rahulji said:
today I see that after March 2024 update my installation is much bigger.
I found that WinSxS is almost 15GB.

It is normall?

Yes, quite normal after a cumulative update. I typically find mine has grown 10+ GB after an update. Then I clean it up and it shrinks to a more reasonable 7-8 GB.

Analyze and Clean Up Component Store (WinSxS folder) in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to analyze and clean up the component store (WinSxS folder) to reduce its size in Windows 10 and Windows 11. The WinSxS folder is located in the Windows folder, for example C:\Windows\WinSxS. It’s the location for Windows Component Store files. The Windows...

www.elevenforum.com

Ghot · Mar 14, 2024

@Rahulji

Here's some other things that may help...

Quickie Eleven Forum Setup Guide for new Members

Quickie Interface tour... Quickie set up... At the top right, click on your name, then choose "Preferences". Then go through everything on the left side. Quickie navigation... Click Forums and choose a subforum, OR... Click Forums, then New Posts or What's New Ranks, Trophies...

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Macrium Reflect, AOMEI Backupper and Hasleo Backup Suite - GUIDES

How to use backup software... 1. When everything is working perfectly... make a full Windows backup. 2. Then, if something breaks... restore from the latest backup. 3. Then... try "whatever you were doing" a different way. If it still breaks Windows, then... go to step #2. 4. Repeat...

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Windows 11 Tweaks - Leader Board.

These are tweaks I've seen asked for... many times. They are collected here for easy access. All of these and more can be found in the Eleven Forum Tutorials Make sure to read the "notes" in the various tutorials. At the bottom of the first post in all the "tutorials", there are links to...

www.elevenforum.com

Rahulji · Mar 14, 2024

Ghot said:
NO. That's too big.

Open a command prompt as admin, and type this command...

Dism.exe /online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup /ResetBase

Here's the full tutorial... works for Win 10 and Win 11...

Clean Up Component Store (WinSxS folder) in Windows 10

How to Clean Up Component Store (WinSxS folder) in Windows 10

www.tenforums.com

Thanks.
It is now 8.3GB.

I was using build-in Disk cleanup, but it seems forget this...

Ghot · Mar 14, 2024

Rahulji said:
Thanks.
It is now 8.3GB.

I was using build-in Disk cleanup, but it seem forget this...

Just so you know.... there's a tutorial for... everything.

Bree · Mar 14, 2024

Rahulji said:
I was using build-in Disk cleanup, but it seems forget this...

You have to use its 'Clean up System Files', and even then it sometimes decides it isn't worth cleaning up Windows Updates yet. I then use DISM if that's the case, that will always clean up WinSxS.

Steve C · Mar 15, 2024

Ghot said:
NO. That's too big.

Open a command prompt as admin, and type this command...

Dism.exe /online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup /ResetBase

Here's the full tutorial... works for Win 10 and Win 11...

Clean Up Component Store (WinSxS folder) in Windows 10

How to Clean Up Component Store (WinSxS folder) in Windows 10

www.tenforums.com

I would use Dism.exe /Online /Cleanup-Image /AnalyzeComponentStore to first check the size of the component store then Dism.exe /online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup to reduce the size. Check the size again with the first command.

Your command will remove the option to revert from previous updates which may be undesirable.

cereberus · Mar 15, 2024

Steve C said:
I would use Dism.exe /Online /Cleanup-Image /AnalyzeComponentStore to first check the size of the component store then Dism.exe /online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup to reduce the size. Check the size again with the first command.

Your command will remove the option to revert from previous updates which may be undesirable.

I have never had an issue with

Dism.exe /online /Cleanup-Image /StartComponentCleanup /ResetBase

but as always image backups are a good plan when using dism tools like above.

Ed Tittel · Mar 15, 2024

I'm not a big fan of /ResetBase: it freezes all currently-installed packages into the OS image. Wrote about this at TekkiGurus: Using DISM /Get-Packages for Windows Image Inspection. See Use Case 1 therein for details. Very interesting!
--Ed--

maur0 · Mar 16, 2024

The best program to clean winsxs and everything else in windows is dism++, this photo below

garlin · Mar 17, 2024

Ed Tittel said:
I'm not a big fan of /ResetBase: it freezes all currently-installed packages into the OS image. Wrote about this at TekkiGurus: Using DISM /Get-Packages for Windows Image Inspection. See Use Case 1 therein for details. Very interesting!
--Ed--

This assertion runs counter to MS's normal guide for Desktop manufacturers.
Reduce the Size of the Component Store in an Offline Windows Image

The usual knock against ResetBase for a live system is you can't roll back a bad update, and are stuck waiting for an emergency hotfix. For a clean install, there's no point preserving the ability to rollback since you can replace with it a differently updated image. The image modding circles I've been with have never complained about ResetBase. If you have any pending operations caused by .NET installs, or Language Packs added in the wrong order, then ResetBase won't work until after the install & reboot clears the pending operations.

I don't agree with your Case 1 analysis, most of those Staged packages are FOD's (Feature on Demand), and the remainder are core OS packages.

If you filter Staged FOD's which are replaced by newer Installed versions, the list of unmatched Staged packages is normal.

Code:

Gp231128(c1step3) filtered by a script

Microsoft-Windows-Client-Desktop-Required-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-Client-Desktop-Required-WOW64-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-Client-Features-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-Client-Features-WOW64-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-Client-LanguagePack-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~en-US
Microsoft-Windows-EditionPack-Professional-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-EditionPack-Professional-WOW64-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-EditionSpecific-Professional-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-EditionSpecific-Professional-WOW64-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-MediaPlayer-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~en-US
Microsoft-Windows-Not-Supported-On-LTSB-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-RegulatedPackages-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-RegulatedPackages-WOW64-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-Required-ShellExperiences-Desktop-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64
Microsoft-Windows-Required-ShellExperiences-Desktop-WOW64-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64

Code:

(Get-ChildItem . -Filter *.txt).FullName | foreach {
    "Parsing {0}`n" -f (Split-Path $_ -Leaf)

    $Staged = @()
    $Superseded = @()
    $Installed = @()

    Get-Content $_ | Select-String '31bf' | foreach {
        $column = ($_ -replace '\s+') -split '\|'
        $BasePackage = ($column[0] -split '~~')[0]

        switch ($column[1]) {
        'Staged' { $Staged += $BasePackage }
        'Superseded' { $Superseded += $BasePackage }
        'Installed' { $Installed += $BasePackage }
        }
    }

    # Don't show if Package matched by Installed
    "Staged:"
    foreach ($Package in $Staged) {
        if (($Installed | Where-Object { $_ -eq $Package }).Count -eq 0) {
            $Package
        }
    }

    "`nSuperseded:"
    foreach ($Package in $Superseded) {
        if (($Installed | Where-Object { $_ -eq $Package }).Count -eq 0) {
            $Package
        }
    }
    "`n`n"
}

Rahulji · Mar 17, 2024

garlin said:
The usual knock against ResetBase for a live system is you can't roll back a bad update, and are stuck waiting for an emergency hotfix.

Thanks for the explanation, I always wait some time after the monthly update, only then I do the cleanup.

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