Charlie Russel's Blog

(Get-WmiObject –ComputerName Server1 –Class Win32_Volume).FreeSpace
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33 Responses to “Getting the Free Disk Space of Remote Computers”

1.   frank Says:
   July 2nd, 2015 at 5:26 am

   Command are not working
   will only show >>

   •   Charlie Russel Says:
     July 3rd, 2015 at 10:13 am

     If you’re seeing “>>” then you’ve missed something in your command. Probably the trailing backtic character which is a line continuation or escape character. If you have a space after the back-tick, it won’t work. The back-tick must be the last character in the line. (It “escapes” the end of line character, allowing the command to continue on the next line as if it were all one continuous command line. )

     Or, it could be an errant mismatch of single and double quotes. An earlier version of this post had unpaired quotes, which has been corrected. It’s easy to get that wrong if you’re typing it in by hand.

2.   Luis Says:
   September 8th, 2016 at 3:34 pm

   Hi Charlie,

   I copy/pasted the code and added my server names. But I am getting this error:

   At line:19 char:7
   + | Format-Table -auto `
   + ~
   An empty pipe element is not allowed.
   + CategoryInfo : ParserError: (:) [], ParentContainsErrorRecordException
   + FullyQualifiedErrorId : EmptyPipeElement

   Regards

   •   Charlie Russel Says:
     September 9th, 2016 at 8:52 am

     That would be because your cut and paste missed the final ` (back-tick) character in the line above.

   •   Charlie Russel Says:
     September 9th, 2016 at 8:56 am

     Same code, slightly different formatting. What caused your problems was that you missed the
     Get-WmiObject -ComputerName $Name -Class Win32_Volume `
     the trailing back tick in that line, or, equally disastrous, you have a space after the back tick. The back-tick MUST be the final character in the line of you’re escaping the end of the line.

3.   Luis Says:
   September 8th, 2016 at 3:56 pm

   I corrected the code and now its working:

   [CmdletBinding()]
   Param ([Parameter(Mandatory=$False,Position=0)]
   [String[]]$ComputerName = “lt-win1064”)
   Write-Host “”
   ForEach ( $Name in $ComputerName ) {
   Write-Host “Disk Utilization for Workstation $Name is: ”
   Get-WmiObject -ComputerName $Name -Class Win32_Volume | FT -auto @{Label=”Drive”;`
   Expression={$_.DriveLetter};`
   Align=”Right”},`
   @{Label=”Free(GB)”;`
   Expression={“{0:N0}” -f ($_.FreeSpace/1GB)};`
   Align=”Right”},`
   @{Label=”% Free”;`
   Expression={“{0:P0}” -f ($_.FreeSpace / $_.Capacity)};`
   Align=”Right”},`
   @{Label=”Size(GB)”;`
   Expression={“{0:N0}” -f ($_.Capacity / 1GB)};`
   Align=”Right”},`
   @{Label=”Volume Label”;`
   Expression={$_.Label};`
   Width=25}
   }

   Regards

   •   Charlie Russel Says:
     September 9th, 2016 at 8:58 am

     As already commented. Your cut and paste either added an extra space after a back tick, or left off a trailing back tick.

     I would note that WordPress has been known to occaisonally add extra blank space where I didn’t want it. so always be careful to verify that the line ends where it should. I try my best, but I’m at the mercy of tools outside of my direct control.

   •   Krishna Says:
     April 11th, 2018 at 10:08 pm

     What Parameter should I add to get a list of computer added with this script.

     •   Charlie Russel Says:
       April 12th, 2018 at 9:31 am

       As this script is written, what you see is what you get. An output that is formatted text showing you the disk utilization on one or more computers, with each computer identified as part of the output. Useful for what I needed, but not useful for anything downstream of it. I improved this script substantially when I revisited it here, and if you look at Robert Carlson’s comment to that post, you’ll see a way to extend what I was doing by turning it into a function that creates a custom object. I took and wrote that up as a full blog post. You could then extend that custom object by including the ComputerName property in the output object to get what I think you want.

4.   Kristian Husby Says:
   November 6th, 2016 at 1:21 am

   This is fantastic. Thank you! Exactly what I was trying to do myself.

5.   Mani Shankar Says:
   November 10th, 2016 at 12:26 am

   hi we use this Scripts for Multiple servers , I have tries but getting below error .

   PS C:\> .\Get-myFreeSpace.ps1
   Missing expression after ‘,’.
   At C:\Get-myFreeSpace.ps1:5 char:51
   + [String[]]$ComputerName = “BLRMCSTVMH08”, <<<< "BLRMCSKMS")
   + CategoryInfo : ParserError: (,:OperatorToken) [], ParseException
   + FullyQualifiedErrorId : MissingExpressionAfterToken

   •   Charlie Russel Says:
     November 13th, 2016 at 3:22 pm

     You appear to have changed the default value to a list of servers with a simple “BLRMCSTVMH08”,”“BLRMCSTVMH08″. Unfortunately, that won’t work. What you need to do is explicitly tell PowerShell that you’re setting a value for the ComputerName parameter that is an array, so use:
     
[CmdletBinding()]
Param ([Parameter(Mandatory=$False,Position=0)]
[String[]]$ComputerName = @(“BLRMCSTVMH08”, "BLRMCSKMS"))


     That should do what you want.

6.   mjstonesr Says:
   March 30th, 2017 at 12:46 pm

   How to export the entire output to a file? I’ve tried output-file and export-cvs and get disk data in the file but still get the server names only on the console by virtue of the “Write-Host “Disk Utilization for server $Name is: “”. I can’t figure out how to get that part to go to file instead of console. I’ve tried modifying the ‘write-host’, but no luck. I’m struggling. Thanks!

   •   Charlie Russel Says:
     March 30th, 2017 at 3:06 pm

     Unfortunately, Write-Host will always write to the console. The solution is to switch to either Out-File or Write-Output. Write-Output allows for redirection, and Out-File always writes to a file. Write-Output is the more flexible of the two solutions, allowing you to redirect as you wish. Frankly, I should have used it for this script, since I had no intention of using some of the advanced console-specific features of Write-Host (such as colouration).

7.   Paul Arbogast Says:
   April 11th, 2017 at 11:00 am

   This is great, however, I’m unable to get it to run the script. I get the following error
   ‘D:\scripts\SCOM_Scripts\DCO_ToolKit_Scripts\checkdiskspace.ps1’ is not
   recognized as the name of a cmdlet, function, script file, or operable
   program.

   Any ideas why?

   •   Charlie Russel Says:
     April 11th, 2017 at 11:21 am

     You can always force execution with a leading & (ampersand). It could be that .PS1 files are not set to execute. Or something else on your system.

     One trick I use is to create a $home\psbin directory and ensure that it is on my path. Also, it’s a good idea to get in the habit of using PowerShell conventions and syntax. Thus I’d likely rename it on your system to something like: Get-myDiskSpace.ps1 or even Check-myDiskSpace.ps1. (Check is not a standard verb, and I avoid non-standard verbs when I can these days. Though goodness knows I’ve got a few scripts left over from my earliest PowerShell days when I was less disciplined. )

     •   Paul Arbogast Says:
       April 11th, 2017 at 12:43 pm

       how does that work exactly, I tried doing D:\scripts\SCOM_Scripts\DCO_ToolKit_Scripts\&checkdiskspace.ps1 in the over ride but just told me the ampersand & character is not allowed and its recovered for future use

       •   Charlie Russel Says:
         April 11th, 2017 at 12:49 pm

         No. The Ampersand goes before the entire path. So, in your case:

         & D:\scripts\SCOM_Scripts\DCO_ToolKit_Scripts\&checkdiskspace.ps1

         Assuming that your checkdiskspace.ps1 script is in that directory.

   •   Paul Arbogast Says:
     April 11th, 2017 at 11:55 am

     ok I think I misunderstood what this script was supposed to do, it does work, however the script that I need to run seems require being located on the remote server I’m checking, I copied my script there as a test and it worked as expected. I’m not sure that I will be given permission to copy powershell scripts to all the servers in the environment, and that would require too much upkeep anyway to make sure new servers got copies. is there anyway this can be ran from the management server to pull the info remotely?

     •   Charlie Russel Says:
       April 11th, 2017 at 12:04 pm

       No need to copy the script to a remote server. The whole point of this is to run remotely. It accepts an array of computer names with the -ComputerName parameter.

8.   Britt Says:
   April 18th, 2017 at 10:15 am

   How can you capture the entire output of this script into a text file? Out of the several things I have tried – I was able to grab some of it but it did not capture “Disk Utilization for server $name is: ” string.
   I have added >> C:\MyLog.txt after :
   Write-Host “Disk Utilization for server $Name is: ”
   and also after:
   …
   @{Label=”Volume Label”;`
   Expression={$_.Label};`
   Width=25} >> C:\CADFREEDISK.TXT

   •   Charlie Russel Says:
     April 18th, 2017 at 10:24 am

     Answered earlier in this list of comments, but once again — change the ‘Write-Host’ lines to ‘Write-Output’ and then you can redirect. Alternately, if you ONLY want output to a file, change to use ‘Out-File’. OR, even better, add the output type as a parameter and branch based on it. You could, for example, add a -FilePath parameter and then when present, output to that file. This is PowerShell — USE IT. :)

     Seriously, if I were writing this script today, I’d use Write-Output. When I wrote it, I had no need or desire to do anything except send it to the screen, so I didn’t bother. But it’s a better practice to use Write-Output except in those cases where you need something like colourization, which would require the features of Write-Host.

     •   Balaji Says:
       December 24th, 2017 at 4:23 am

       Hello Charlie,

       I want to output the result to a CSV file. I used this “out-file C:\Drives.csv”. But the output is coming in the single column instead of separate for each value. Can you please let me know how to get the desired output?

       Thanks,
       Balaji

9.   Safet Grahic Says:
   June 9th, 2017 at 1:29 am

   #>
   [CmdletBinding()]
   Param(
   [Parameter(Mandatory=$False,Position=0,`
   ValueFromPipeline=$True,`
   ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName=$True,`
   ValueFromRemainingArguments=$True)]
   [alias(“Name”,”Computer”)]
   [string[]]
   [string[]]$ComputerName = (Get-Content “c:\temp\pc.txt”)
   )

   Begin {
   if ($Input) {
   $ComputerName = @($Input)
   }
   Write-Output “”
   # Save ErrorActionPreference so we can reset it when we’re done
   $eap = $ErrorActionPreference
   }

   Process {
   $ErrorActionPreference = ‘SilentlyContinue’
   ForEach ( $Computer in $ComputerName ) {
   #Write-Output “Disk Utilization for Computer $Computer is: ”
   Get-WmiObject -ComputerName $Computer -Class Win32_Volume -Filter ‘DriveLetter = “C:”‘`
   | Format-Table -auto `
   @{Label=”Computer”;`
   Expression={$Computer};`
   Align=”Right”},
   @{Label=”Drive”;`
   Expression={$_.DriveLetter};`
   Align=”Right”},`
   @{Label=”Free(GB)”;`
   Expression={“{0:N0}” -f ($_.FreeSpace/1GB)};`
   Align=”Right”},`
   @{Label=”% Free”;`
   Expression={“{0:P0}” -f ($_.FreeSpace / $_.Capacity)};`
   Align=”Right”},`
   @{Label=”Size(GB)”;`
   Expression={“{0:N0}” -f ($_.Capacity / 1GB)};`
   Align=”Right”} >> C:\temp\freedisk.TXT
   #@{Label=”Volume Label”;`
   #Expression={$_.Label};`
   #Width=25}
   } #EndForEach
   } #EndProcessBlock

   End {
   # Reset ErrorActionPreference to original value
   $ErrorActionPreference = $eap
   }

10.   MisterDD Says:
    October 16th, 2017 at 8:17 am

    This is my sauce :)

    Function Get-LocalDiskInformation {

    [cmdletbinding(DefaultParameterSetName = ‘ComputerName’)]
    param(
    [parameter( Mandatory = $false,
    ParameterSetName = ‘ComputerName’,
    Position = 0,
    ValueFromPipeline = $true,
    ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName = $true )]
    [String[]]$ComputerName = $env:COMPUTERNAME,

    [parameter( Mandatory = $false,
    Position = 0,
    ParameterSetName = ‘FromClipboard’,
    ValueFromPipeline = $true,
    ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName = $true)]
    [switch]$FromClipboard

    )

    if ( $FromClipboard ) {
    $Computers = $( Get-Clipboard -Format Text )
    }
    elseif ( $ComputerName ) {
    $Computers = $ComputerName
    }

    $Computers[0..$Computers.Count] | ForEach-Object {
    $Computer = $_
    if ( Test-Connection $Computer -Count 1 -Quiet ) {
    try {
    $DiskInfo = Get-WmiObject -ComputerName $Computer –Class Win32_Volume -Filter “DriveLetter=’C:'”
    }
    catch {
    if ($error[0].Exception.Message -like ‘*The RPC server is unavailable*’) {
    break
    }
    else { $error[0].Exception.Message }
    }
    $Status = ‘Online’
    }
    else {
    $Status = ‘Not Online’
    }

    if ( $Status -Like ‘Online’ ) {

    [PSCustomObject]@{
    ComputerName = $Computer
    Drive = $DiskInfo.DriveLetter
    ‘Size(GB)’ = “{0:N2}” -f ( $DiskInfo.Capacity / 1GB )
    ‘Free(GB)’ = “{0:N2}” -f ($DiskInfo.FreeSpace / 1GB)
    ‘% Free’ = “{0:P2}” -f ($DiskInfo.FreeSpace / $DiskInfo.Capacity )
    Status = $Status

    }
    }
    elseif ( $Status -Like ‘Not Online’ ) {

    [PSCustomObject]@{
    ComputerName = $Computer
    Drive = $null
    ‘Size(GB)’ = $null
    ‘Free(GB)’ = $null
    ‘% Free’ = $null
    Status = $Status

    }
    }
    }
    }

    •   Charlie Russel Says:
      October 16th, 2017 at 8:22 am

      And it yields a PSCustomObject, always useful. Thanks.

11.   Omar Says:
    June 6th, 2018 at 3:05 pm

    Worked like a charm and saved me a hell of a lot of time!! Thanks!

    •   Charlie Russel Says:
      June 8th, 2018 at 3:41 pm

      Thanks for your comment, Omar, I appreciate it. Do check out the updated versions of this:
      https://blogs.msmvps.com/russel/2017/04/18/getting-the-free-disk-space-of-remote-computers-revisited/
      https://blogs.msmvps.com/russel/2017/05/04/guest-post-get-myfreespace-revisited/

      Both provide an updated look at finding the free disk space, and let’s face it — I’ve learned a few things since this original post. :)

12.   Lars Panzerbjørn Says:
    August 8th, 2018 at 3:11 am

    Probably not what you intended as such, but this is probably the simplest & clearest description of @{}, what it does and is for in this kind of output, that I am directing people here to learn how to use it.
    Thanks, it is way better than how I explain it…

    •   Charlie Russel Says:
      August 8th, 2018 at 9:13 am

      Thank you. I do spend some effort to show not just the result, but how to get there, and it’s nice to hear that it’s noticed and appreciated!

      Do also look at the two updated versions of this script. Not for the @{} formatting, which I didn’t cover in depth because I’d already covered it here, but for coverage of some other issues with this original script. Which definitely showed the “good enough for me” approach I sometimes take.

      •   Lars Panzerbjørn Says:
        September 21st, 2018 at 3:47 am

        You’re welcome :-)
        And “Good Enough” is a good starting point ;-)

13.   Shivem Says:
    August 21st, 2018 at 6:00 am

    Hi will this also work for servers that do not have PowerShell installed? Also, would the Windows machine I run this on have to be on the same network as my servers?

    •   Charlie Russel Says:
      August 21st, 2018 at 9:50 am

      PowerShell is installed on all Windows Servers that are currently in support, so the question doesn’t apply for them. For non-Windows Servers, the answer is a bit more complicated. This script script could be modified to use CIM instead of WMI, and then you should be able to use it, assuming you’ve set permissions correctly and configure your firewalls correctly.

      And yes, they need to be on the same network. I don’t think WMI calls will cross router boundaries.