Will having multiple user accounts on my PC take up more space than having just one?

Question

Will having multiple user accounts on my PC take up a lot more hard disk space than having just one?

Answer 1

A LOT more space? Depends on whether the other user saves a lot of stuff. But just by creating another user account won't take up much space.

From here:

A "User Account" by itself takes up very little space. But once that user first logs in, Windows creates a "Profile" for that user which can take up a lot of space. The Profile includes all files used on that user's desktop and the files under that user's "My Documents" folder (among others) which can be quite sizable but does include all that user's files and preferences.

So it's basically determined by the user.

In Windows XP, you can see the amount of space used by each users profile by:

Right-Click "My Computer" -> Properties -> Advanced (Tab) -> Settings (in User Profile Section)

If you have permission, you can select a profile and hit the "Delete" button to free up that disk space. It will re-create the next time that user logs on but will delete all that user's files.

In Windows 7, the same screen can be gotten to by:

Right-Click "Computer" -> Properties -> Advanced System Settings -> Advanced (Tab) -> Settings in the User Profile Section.

You can also set quotas for each user account by following the steps here.