Unnecessary Low Disk Space Warning

For years now I have been getting the low disk space warning. For years now I have reported this to you guys. For years now nothing has changed.

I have multiple hard drives on my computer. One of them is used exclusively by Windows Backup. I have instructed Windows Backup to use as much of the disk drive as it needs. This results in the free space on that one drive dropping well below 10%. This is by design. This is desired. My boot drive has close to 60% free space.

Yet I keep getting these warnings.

Please stop doing this. Please. It is not only annoying, it detracts from the real potential problem of low disk space on the boot drive which IS important.

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Comments

GregJohnsonDSM

It's not just the free version that this doesn't work in. The paid version also has misleading disk space usage warnings.

zorvek

And, as I stated twice now, that function, as implemented in the free version, is essentially not only useless, it is misleading.

There is an old adage in UI/functionality design: if you can't implement it as the user expects it to function, don't implement it at all. A half-baked and/or deficient presentation of a function or feature often does more harm than not.

Given the resistance to fixing how the feature works in the free version, I will leave you with the suggestion that the default the setting be checked off in that version and, when checked on, display a dialog stating it's limitations and how to take advantage of the more complete and actually useful functionality in the paid version.

As I use the tool only occasionally and only for personal use, I am not inclined to purchase a license given the free version is distributed for just this scenario. So I will leave you with my suggestion for how to improve the product and I will disable the health checks. The health checks in the free version do not function as expected or needed, and are misleading. At the end of the day I don’t need a health check, especially one that doesn’t work, nor do I want to pay a license fee just to be alerted that my hard disk is getting full – Windows does a reasonably good job of that without the aid of third party tools.

JoshP

Hello @zorvek

Thank you for your feedback.

As mentioned, the Integrated System Health Check is a more simplified version of our TeamViewer Monitoring & Asset Management services - it provides a few updates as reported from the Operating System; disk space is one of the four checks provided for free.

As mentioned previously, while the settings for the automated Integrated System Health Checks cannot be altered, TeamViewer Monitoring does provide the control you seek. The ability to set the alerts only for a specific drive letter and even alter the overall threshold is possible:

With TeamViewer Monitoring, you only set the alerts for the drives you want - all other drives are ignored unless you add a check for the other local drives as well
If you wish to be alerted at a different percentage, MB, or GB threshold, you can set the alert for each individual drive

As the controls you seek are already a part of the dedicated TeamViewer Monitoring service, I would recommend you give that a quick look - you can start a free trial from the Management Console; once the service is installed, you will only see alerts for the drives you choose and at the thresholds you want, and even get an email notification when such an issue occurs.

zorvek

The point has been missed.

The low disk space warning is a welcome feature - if it worked. The issue is that it does NOT work. I have three drives on the machine in question. One, the boot drive, has about 60% free space. The second, an archive drive, has about 30% free space. The third drive is reserved for the Windows backup and restoration service. It is instructed to use as much available space as possible to do its work and maintain as many file images as will fit in the space available. This is as designed, intentional, and does not put the operation of the system at risk nor does it hinder TeamViewer from performing its functions. Its free space averages about 5%.

The only drive that is relevant to system operations and TeamViewer functionality is the main or C drive. This is the boot drive and, in most normal installations, is the only drive used for system operations. This is the drive that matters. Not any of the secondary drives. That TeamViewer's "Integrated System Health Checks" does not distinguish one drive from the other in terms of importance and relevancy as to the system's actual heath renders the "low disk space" warning effectively useless and prone to false positives.

In other words, I DO want to know if my main or C drive is low on space. This is important to me. But TeamViewer shows this warning if ANY drive has less than 10% free space which renders this check a misleading nuisance versus a helpful message that inspires action on my part to ensure the ongoing health of my system.

Yes, I have realized and continue to realize I can disable this warning. Your post does not help me.

I want you to realize that the feature is poorly implemented and that someone responsible for implementing, maintaining, and/or testing this logic should take note and make an effort to alter it's behavior so that the feature can become the feature that it was originally intended to be.

More specifically, one of two paths come to mind:

Provide a list of drives associated with the host machine that can be included/excluded with regard to the health check.
Determine which drive is the boot and/or temporary file drive (they can be different in rare cases) and only perform the health check on the relevant drives.

JoshP

Hello @zorvek

Thank you for your post.

The alerts you are referring to are from the Integrated System Health Checks feature of TeamViewer. These alerts are a more simplified and basic version of our TeamViewer Monitoring & Asset Management services (where thresholds and other settings can be altered) and are reported from the OS itself.

If you do not want to see these alerts, you can turn it off in the device's TeamViewer Advanced settings:
2020-05-04 09_24_55-Window.png

If these devices are assigned to a licensed account, the setting can even be added to a policy so you may disable the checks on all devices

You can find more information on how to turn off these notifications here: How can I disable the alert messages in my Computers & Contacts list?