What utilities really work?

[MikeA]

I have another thread active right now concerning reformatting my HD and reloading XP. Some of the responses there though have leaned me in another direction so I thought I'd ask it here.
I have about 2.6 GB disk space available on an old 8 GB HD and I know that I should have more. I've removed just about everything from the machine except a full MS Office Suite (including Access, PowerPoint & Publisher), MS Money, McAfee Viruscan, Zone Alarm, Spybot & Ad-Aware. My kids had loaded all kinds of games on the system inlcuding The Sims and I've deleted all of them plus all photos, music files, nonessential Word, Excel, Access, Publisher, and Power Point files. I've also used XP's Disk Cleanup utility. I feel like I should have more space available than 2.6 GB.
Also, my McAfee viruscan hasn't been working for the last couple of months. I've severely limited the kids access to the machine and tried to get on the internet only when I have to and used Zone Alarm to lock down internet access when I'm on the computer but not online. I have bought an upgrade to my old Viruscan program and I'm going to load it tonight.
So what utilities do you guys recommend for cleaning up and reclaiming HD space? What about for cleaning out other "bugs" that I get from the internet? I downloaded a "free" version of PC Bug Finder and it ran through my system and said it found 406 "problems" but I can't fix any of them until I buy the product. (Oh yeah, that's free) I'm not familar with this type of app though so was looking for some advice on what to use. I'm not trying to be cheap, I just don't want to throw my money away on apps that say that they'll fix problems and they end up taking up more disk space and installing who knows what else on my system.

[doctorgonzo]

Spybot: Search and Destroy
Ad-Aware
Swat it!
AVG Antivirus

All free.

Stay away from McAfee.

When you are trying to free up space and nothing else works, do a search for large files on your HD, and also check to see how much space each directory takes up. That can point out files you may have missed.

[Panama Red]

An 8GB hard drive is barely enough to run XP and a minimum number of apps. If it was me, rather than concerning myself with how to reclaim space on an old, slow hard drive, I'd invest about $60 in a new 80GB Western Digital hard drive with 8mb cache. The performance increase over an older hdd is huge. Kinda like adding more memory. Remove the old 8Gb, install the new 80 (part no. WD800JB), use the XP disk to format and install, and everyone will be happy. Kids get room for games, dad has room for programs/apps/picture storage and you won't be spending your time figuring how to reclaim space. Dr. G has given you good advice on the maintenance apps to use. I concur, stay away from McAwful.

edit: Just checked Newegg and the WD800JB is on sale for $59.99 with free shipping.

http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProduc...144-122&depa=0

[TwoRails]

I agree 100% about getting a larger drive. By the time you load XP, some necessary untilities (AV, firewall, the items mentioned above, etc.) and just a few jpegs or mp3s, you will be out of room. I have't read the other thread, but it being such a small drive, I wonder if the rest of the system is too old to (easily) update and use a larger drive.