People using Windows Vista as their operating system will come across a Previous version tab under the properties of an element. This provides the user with the option to restore previously used items or versions with a simple click. This would eventually create a shadow copy on the system. This Previous version function consumes a lot of space on the system's disk. There are different way of disabling the Previous version tab. The user has to go to the start menu and type the phrase "services.msc" in the search bar. The next step would be to double click on the option volume shadow. Check out the article below for the remaining steps to follow...

Disabling the previous version tab

The Previous versions tab located under the properties of an element under Windows Vista allows the restore of an item at a later date. It acts as a shadow copy generated by the system for back up.

This function is very disk space consuming and sometimes useless. Below is a tip on how to disable this function:

1. Disable volume shadow

• Go to the menu Start and type services.msc in the search bar and then click OK.
• Double click on "Volume Shadow"
• Change the startup type to "Manual" (Do not select "Off" as it will switch off System Restore).
• Click on "Stop"
• Go to the tab "Recovery"
• Ensure that the three options "First, second and third failure" are on "Do Nothing".
• Click on "OK" to confirm.

2. Disable the "previous versions"

• Once the service disabled, the "Previous Versions" is useless.
• So to lighten the menu and properties of elements, it is better to remove it as shown below:

Before any configuration, backup the registry (recommended).

• Open the Registry Editor (Start/run/regedit).

Scroll the key: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \ Policies \ Microsoft \

• Create a new key with the name PreviousVersions (Edit menu> New> Key)
• Create a new DWORD (32bits) under the following key with the name DisableLocalPage (Edit menu> New> DWORD (32 bit)).
• Double click on the value and put 1 in the data fields.

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