I received the dreaded "not enough room to install your update" message a couple of days ago. I have an AMD Ryzen i5 with a 500gb (475gb usable) hard disk. I checked an realised that I had about 50gb free and my MSFS install in the packages directory was over 300gb. So ...... After reading a few threads I moved packages to my hard drive and edited the config file. I fired up the sim and had a few problems. Next move was to remove MSFS and re-install the vanilla product without any add-ons. 

That is where I am at now. I have installed only the 2 world updates pertinent to where I go flying every day.  I will reinstall some of my Orbx products but not all.

This does not bother me too much because I have a gaming PC that my wife uses for work every day and I know I can install anything and everything on that when she gives up work later this year. 

But I was wondering if anyone else plays on a similar laptop and if so what they have loaded onto their machines. How much free space does one need on a machine?

One thing that would help is to uninstall stuff from Content Manager that you will not be using. Stuff like liveries, discovery flights, bush flights, planes you will never fly, etc.

When you go to the Content Manager in MSFS, look to the top right, there are two icons that control how things are listed, either as packages or as individual items. Start with uninstalling packages that you do not want, then change to individual items and uninstall those that you do not want. Be patient, as the uninstall process can be a bit slow.

I've done most of that, and my "Official" folder is about 165 gb now.

...jim

 

Thanks Jim. I will do that next. I re-installed all my Oceanic airports and scenery enhancements from ORBX so it would be good to get rid of more stuff I do not use as you have suggested.