Win. Sx. S Folder in Windows 1. Most of you may have noticed the Win. Sx. S folder in Windows 781. For those who have not, the folder is situated at C WindowsWinsxs and has a whopping size How to Open DLL Files. The Dynamic Link Library, or DLL file, is a mainstay of traditional Windows programming. These files are used by programs to gain. Mine is almost 5 GB and has around 6. Windows folder While the size of this Winsxs folder, in XP is around 2. MB its large size in Windows 1. Windows 8, Windows 7 and Windows Vista, is intriguing, to many Check the image below. Download the DLL first. If it is for a game, copy it into C Program files Gamethis is the name of your game. If this dosent work place a copy in CWindowsSystem32. C493' alt='Where To Place Dll Files Windows 7' title='Where To Place Dll Files Windows 7' />So what is the mystery of this Winsxs folder in Windows Vista and later Let us find so, in this post. The Winsxs folder, stores multiple copies of dlls in order to let multiple applications run in Windows without any compatibility problem. If you browse inside, you will see what look like a lot of duplicate dlls, each having the same name. These are actually, different versions of the same files which are being stored as different programs may require different versions. Where To Place Dll Files Windows 7' title='Where To Place Dll Files Windows 7' />Win. Sx. S folder Windows 1. In short, Winsxs, which stands for Windows Side By Side, is Windows native assembly cache. Libraries which are being by multiple applications are stored there. This feature was first introduced, in Windows ME and was considered as Microsofts solution to the so called dll hell issues that plagued Windows 9x. Where To Place Dll Files Windows 7' title='Where To Place Dll Files Windows 7' />In Winsxs the backup folder is the largest as can be noticed in the image below. Again, as can be seen in the image below, in the Winsxs folder, the Other File types takes the bulk of the space. These primarily consist of. In Windows 7 and later, there isnt a dllcache folder and nor can you find the i. XP all its source modules. It is this Win. Sx. S folder which stores the shared components of side by side applications. These files can be multiple versions of the same assembly or application. Every side by side assembly has a unique identity. One of the attributes of the assembly identity is its version. Side by side assemblies are used by the operating system as fundamental units of naming, binding, versioning, deployment, and configuration. The Winsxs folder includes all manifests, optional components and 3rd party Win. But, why so many subfolders, and why keep so many different versions of the same dll, exe or other files As mentioned, Windows stores the old dlls and library components in the Win. Sx. S folder. Now if a newer version of this file is a part of the OS, but a particular application requires a particular older version for running, then the older version from the winsxs folder will be used, leaving the newer version in its present place, for other applications which may require it. So obviously you cannot delete this directory or move it elsewhere. Nor is it advisable to delete anything here, as such a step could probably make your applications un workable or even break your system If you have many applications installed, you can expect to have a jumbo sized winsxs folder. This Win. Sxs folder cannot reside on any other volume than the system volume. This is because of the NTFS hard links. If you try to move the folder, it may result in Windows updates, service packs, features, etc, not installing correctly. If you delete components from the Win. Sx. S folder like the manifests or the assemblies, etc, you could be in trouble. Each system would react differently. What may work for one could break anotherFor instance, if you install a program that requires that particular assembly, which you may have deleted, then that program will just not run Compressing the folder is also a no no, as it could cause problems during Windows. Updates or while installing a Hotfix. The safest way to clean it, is by simply uninstalling applications which you dont require. However, this too is not fool proof, as many applications still leave behind their files here, since they may be shared between other applications. So the probability of dud unused dlls being left behind is quite high. We would not advice the use of Win. Sx. S cleanup tools like Winsxs. Lite as you could end up breaking your Windows. And if you are into trying out new software or installing and uninstalling frequently, you may notice that your Winsxs size is indeed large, as Windows will store multiple copies of these dll files, in order to let multiple applications without compatibility problem. Win. Sxs Folder Cleanup. Windows 8. 1 introduced a new command line option for DISM. Analyze. Component. Store. Running this command, will analyze the Win. Sx. S folder and tell you whether a Component Store Cleanup is recommended or not. In Windows 8, open Disk Cleanup Tool and use the Windows Update Cleanup option to clean the Win. Sxs. Microsoft released an Update that added the Windows Update Cleanup option to Disk Cleanup tool in Windows 7. You can now also clean up Win. Sx. S in Windows Server 2. R2 with new the new Update. Here are some other options you may consider to free up disk space some routine and some extreme Run Disk Cleanup tool or CCleaner. Uninstall unused applications. Move Page file to another drive. Disable hibernation. Use the dedicated dump file option to capture memory dump files on another volume on the system. Disable system restore points. Offload user profile and program file directories to another volume on the system. Update 1 From Tech. Net Blogs  One of the largest changes between previous versions of Windows and Windows 7 Vista was a move from an INF described OS to componentization. All of the components in the operating system are found in the Win. Sx. S folder in fact we call this location the component store. Each component has a unique name that includes the version, language, and processor architecture that it was built for. The Win. Sx. S folder is the only location that the component is found on the system, all other instances of the files that you see on the system are projected by hard linking from the component store. Now that you know why the store can grow to be so large, your next question is probably to ask why we dont remove the older versions of the components. The short answer to that is reliability. The component store, along with other information on the system, allows us to determine at any given time what the best version of a component to project is. That means that if you uninstall a security update we can install the next highest version on the system we no longer have an out of order uninstall problem. It also means that if you decide to install an optional feature, we dont just choose the RTM version of the component, well look to see what the highest available version on the system is. The only way to safely reduce the size of the Win. Sx. S folder is to reduce the set of possible actions that the system can take the easiest way to do that is to remove the packages that installed the components in the first place. This can be done by uninstalling superseded versions of packages that are on your system. Service Pack 1 contains a binary called VSP1. CLN. EXE, a tool that will make the Service Pack package permanent not removable on your system, and remove the RTM versions of all superseded components. This can only be done because by making the Service Pack permanent we can guarantee that we wont ever need the RTM versions. Update 2 From E7 Blogs  Modularizing the operating system was an engineering goal in Windows Vista. This was to solve a number of issues in legacy Windows related to installation, servicing and reliability. The Windows Sx. S directory represents the installation and servicing state of all system components. Download Idapi. 32. Windows 1. 0, 8. 1, 8, 7, Vista and XPWhat is Idapi. What Does It Do link. The Idapi. 32. dll file is 0. MB. The download links have been checked and there are no problems. You can download it without a problem. Currently, it has been downloaded 2. Operating Systems Compatible with the Idapi. Filelink. Other Versions of the Idapi. Filelink. The latest version of the Idapi. This dll file only has one version. There is no other version that can be downloaded. Bit x. 86Download directly this version nowSteps to Download the Idapi. Filelink First, click the Download button with the green background The button marked in the picture. Step 1 Download the Idapi. When you click the Download button, the Downloading window will open. Dont close this window until the download process begins. The download process will begin in a few seconds based on your Internet speed and computer. Methods to Solve the Idapi. Errorslink. ATTENTION Before starting the installation, the Idapi. If you have not downloaded it, download the file before continuing with the installation steps. If you dont know how to download it, you can immediately browse the dll download guide above. Method 1 Installing the Idapi. File to the Windows System Folderlink The file you will download is a compressed file with the. You cannot directly install the. Because of this, first, double click this file and open the file. You will see the file named Idapi. Drag this file to the desktop with the left mouse button. This is the file you need. Step 1 Extracting the Idapi. Copy the Idapi. 32. C WindowsSystem. Step 2 Copying the Idapi. WindowsSystem. 32 folder If your system is 6. Bit, copy the Idapi. C Windowssys. WOW6. NOTE On 6. 4 Bit systems, you must copy the dll file to both the sys. WOW6. 4 and System. In other words, both folders need the Idapi. Step 3 Copying the Idapi. Windowssys. WOW6. First, we must run the Windows Command Promptas an administrator. NOTE We ran the Command Prompt on Windows 1. If you are using Windows 8. Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista or Windows XP, you can use the same methods to run the Command Prompt as an administrator. Open the Start Menu and type in cmd, but dont press Enter. Doing this, you will have run a search of your computer through the Start Menu. In other words, typing in cmd we did a search for the Command Prompt. When you see the Command Prompt option among the search results, push the CTRL SHIFT ENTER keys on your keyboard. A verification window will pop up asking, Do you want to run the Command Prompt as with administrative permission Approve this action by saying, Yes. Step 4 Running the Command Prompt with administrative permission Paste the command below into the Command Line window that opens and hit the Enter key on your keyboard. This command will delete the Idapi. It will not delete the file you pasted into the System. Regedit. The file you pasted in the System. System. 32regsvr. Idapi. 32. dll. Step 5 Uninstalling the Idapi. If the Windows you use has 6. Bit architecture, after running the command above, you must run the command below. This command will clean the broken registry of the Idapi. Bit architecture The Cleaning process is only with registries in the Windows Registry Editor. In other words, the dll file that we pasted into the Sys. Wo. W6. 4 folder will stay as it is. Sys. Wo. W6. 4regsvr. Idapi. 32. dll. Step 6 Uninstalling the broken registry of the Idapi. Windows Registry Editor for 6. Bit In order to cleanly recreate the dll files registry that we deleted, copy the command below and paste it into the Command Line and hit Enter. System. 32regsvr. Idapi. 32. dll. Step 7 Reregistering the Idapi. If you are using a 6. Bit operating system, after running the command above, you also need to run the command below. With this command, we will have added a new file in place of the damaged Idapi. Sys. Wo. W6. 4regsvr. Idapi. 32. dll. Step 8 Reregistering the Idapi. Bit You may see certain error messages when running the commands from the command line. These errors will not prevent the installation of the Idapi. Game Diablo 3 Offline Full Version. In other words, the installation will finish, but it may give some errors because of certain incompatibilities. After restarting your computer, to see if the installation was successful or not, try running the software that was giving the dll error again. If you continue to get the errors when running the software after the installation, you can try the 2nd Method as an alternative. Method 4 Solving the Idapi. Windows System File Checkerlink First, we must run the Windows Command Promptas an administrator. NOTE We ran the Command Prompt on Windows 1. If you are using Windows 8. Windows 8, Windows 7, Windows Vista or Windows XP, you can use the same methods to run the Command Prompt as an administrator. Open the Start Menu and type in cmd, but dont press Enter. Doing this, you will have run a search of your computer through the Start Menu. In other words, typing in cmd we did a search for the Command Prompt. When you see the Command Prompt option among the search results, push the CTRL SHIFT ENTER keys on your keyboard. A verification window will pop up asking, Do you want to run the Command Prompt as with administrative permission Approve this action by saying, Yes. Step 1 Running the Command Prompt with administrative permission Paste the command in the line below into the Command Line that opens up and press Enter key. Step 2 solving Windows system errors using the sfc scannow command. The scan and repair process can take some time depending on your hardware and amount of system errors. Wait for the process to complete. After the repair process finishes, try running the software that is giving youre the error. Method 5 Getting Rid of Idapi. Errors by Updating the Windows Operating Systemlink. Some softwares require updated dll files from the operating system. If your operating system is not updated, this requirement is not met and you will receive dll errors. Because of this, updating your operating system may solve the dll errors you are experiencing. Most of the time, operating systems are automatically updated. However, in some situations, the automatic updates may not work. For situations like this, you may need to check for updates manually. For every Windows version, the process of manually checking for updates is different. Because of this, we prepared a special guide for each Windows version. You can get our guides to manually check for updates based on the Windows version you use through the links below. Guides to Manually Update the Windows Operating Systemlink Guide to Manually Update Windows 1. Guide to Manually Update Windows 8. Windows 8 Guide to Manually Update Windows 7 and Windows Vista Guide to Manually Update Windows XP Most Seen Idapi. Errorslink. The Idapi. Windows system toolsWindows Media Player, Paint, etc. Below you can find a list of errors that can be received when the Idapi. If you have come across one of these errors, you can download the Idapi. Download button on the top left of this page. We explained to you how to use the file youll download in the above sections of this writing. You can see the suggestions we gave on how to solve your problem by scrolling up on the page. Idapi. The file Idapi. Idapi. 32. dll access violation. Cannot register Idapi. Cannot find Idapi. This application failed to start because Idapi.