Can the size of dynamic .vdi (running W7) be reduced?

[metropical]

what are the steps to do this if possible?
The virtual size is 25G, the actual is 20G, though I dunno why it's that big even, unless W7 takes up a lot of space.
I have only 2 small apps installed, MP3tag and AZedit for editing broadcast comms.
Would I be able to reduce to 10G or so?

[mpack]

Yes, Win7 takes up a lot of space for executables, plus there will be a swap file which is proportional to the amount of RAM you gave the OS (x3 as I recall). Possibly a hibernation file too. Plus your update packs and internet history. Etc etc. 10G will be too small for Win7, especially if you mean Win7-64bit. The Microsoft specified minimum hard disk sizes for Win7 are 16GB for the 32bit OS, and 20GB for the 64bit OS.

If you are determined to reduce disk space then in fact you don't reduce disk space, you just reduce the size of the system partition. Then you compact and clone to discard the unwanted unpartitioned space.

It would be far better you got yourself an larger drive: it's generally cheaper than spending a lot of your time fighting disk space shortages.

[metropical]

thanks very for the info. I suspected W7 64b was kind of large itself. Oh well.

[socratis]

Would I be able to reduce to 10G or so?

No. The OS itself needs space. It's not your apps only. It's the support that goes with it. For example, I keep "clean" VMs for testing. Here are some numbers (in GB):

• Windows 10 (64): 20.61
• Windows 7 (32): 15.18
• OpenIndiana: 7.81
• ...
• FreeDOS: 0.11

Your options may vary...