As we reported back in January, the May release of 1903 will permanently reserve 7GB of disk space. It is also blocking updates on PCs that use USB storage or SD cards.  While this will avoid out-of-disk errors and inappropriate drive reassignment when updating, it represents a substantial reduction in usable space on low-storage systems.

Previously, Microsoft would use the release of a new operating system to bump the minimum hardware requirements that the software needs. 32-bit Windows had a minimum storage requirement of 16GB, and 64-bit Windows needed 20GB. Both of these were extremely tight, leaving little breathing room for actual software, but technically this was enough space for everything to work. That minimum has now been bumped up: it’s 32GB for both 32- and 64-bit versions of Windows.

The following error message will be shown for Windows 10 users where the May 2019 Update has been blocked because of problematic external USB storage devices or SD cards.

If you see this message, just remove the external USB or SD media and restart the update.

For the permanently reserved 7GB of disk space, there are still unknowns about how this will work. For instance, will this reserved storage space be manageable through group policies?

This change leaves IT with an important question, do all Windows devices have the necessary space to facilitate this new demand? To prevent going to every single device and noting its current storage space, utilize an IT solution with comprehensive inventory information.

Syxsense displays current data from your devices. Looking at the free disk space information, there will be no question as to which devices have enough space to handle this new Windows function.

Start a  trial Syxsense and all of its features before Windows rolls out their next update.