Is there a way for Windows 7 to show remaining disk space in the status bar?

Question

This is really driving me nuts. I do a lot of moving media files to and from USB drives, and I am constantly looking to the status bar to see how much remaining space I have on a drive. It's quick, and doesn't involve any clicking. At least, that's what I used to do using Windows XP. Is there a way to get the status bar in Windows 7 to behave in the same way?

I saw in a Wikipedia article that some features have been removed from Windows 7, including these two that seem to be affecting me the most:

• The size of any selected item and free disk space are not shown on the status bar.
• When no items are selected in a folder, neither the details pane nor the status bar show the total size of files in the folder.

Are there any plug-ins or registry tweaks that can be made to return this functionality? If not what is the quickest way to get the remaining space on a drive without having to click on something and leaving the directory you are working in?

Answer 1

Annoyingly, I don't think this exists.

View->Choose details has a "Space Free" setting, but that shows nothing unless you're viewing My Computer.

You can view as "Tiles" or "Content" to show the size of files in a directory.

This thread has some MVP trying to justify the removal.

The reason?

it was "removed due to a user anxiety problem, usually caused by reserved space allocations for the Virtual Memory"

Answer 2

Finally a solution: http://classicshell.sourceforge.net/

"Classic Shell is a collection of features that were available in older versions of Windows but are removed from Vista and Windows 7. It has a classic start menu for Windows 7, it adds a toolbar for Windows Explorer and supports a variety of smaller features."

It's free and it's more like a plug-in for Explorer, you can customize the feel & look of the new Explorer to be more like the one from XP. And yeah, it shows the free disk space in the status bar.

Cheers

Answer 3

Just a point of clarification on this statement.

• The size of any selected item and free disk space are not shown on the status bar.

While "the size of any selected item" is not show in the status bar. An interested user like yourself can choose to show the details pane (Organize -> Layout -> Details Pane), wich does in-fact show the size of any selected item(s), along with other details, including the item count. It's no longer in the status bar, but it is availiable in the details pane.

Also,

• When no items are selected in a folder, neither the details pane nor the status bar show the total size of files in the folder.

While this is true, once you select any number of files, the total size of those files will be shown in the details page. I can see how for the average user the it may be ambiguous whether that folder "size" includes the sub-folder sizes, perhaps this is the reason why this isn't displayed for the "folder" anymore, only actual files that are selected.

I'm with you on the free space though. I still look for that like I would a phantom limb.