hard disk space

[stolport]

I've got a new computer and haven't downloaded anything of any significance. Yesterday I could hear the computer 'working away', then I had a 4OD pop-up message saying my available drive (or something similar) was nearly full. I wasn't downloading anything on 4OD. I checked my system and all of I sudden I've got about 20GB out of 285 GB free. I'm sure this was at least 100 free the day before. How can it have grown so much? I've tried searching for large files and to clean up my storage but I can't find anything of such a large file size.

Does anyone know what could have happend and what the solution is?

Thanks.

[green granite]

Auto-backup switched on?

[stolport]

No its switched off. I did load a lot of files onto the Bullguard Backup drive but this was to their online site via my antivirus programme. I wouldn't think this would have used up the pc memory?

[Tex37]

Try viewing "hidden files and folders" see what that turns up. Usually system restore files or cache that you don't need.
Vista is very good at using lots of HDD space for no apparant reason.

[Saab Dastard]

One possibility is that your PC has been compromised by a trojan or virus and is now a host for a file-sharing network.

It happens.

SD

[stolport]

Try viewing "hidden files and folders" see what that turns up.

I've found a hidden folder called ProgramData which has used up 200GB This has a 198GB Bullguard folder. Is this a temporary file which I can delete? Maybe it is a temp file created when I uploaded files to their online drive or is it best to ask Bullguard online support?