I had used vLite and removed some of the larger features. All languages, tablet pc, natural language, drivers, and a few other things that were over 500MB or so inside the image. (my image fits on 4GB I-RAM DDR SSD) Funny though, WinSXS seems to have lots of files that don't really exist or is it the System32 directory is the one that is being emulated. Either way, even though many files in WinSXS show up in file properties, they are only stored on the HDD once, so the file properties is lying to you a little bit. My Windows Folder alone is 5.3 GB and my HDD is 3.86 GB in size. I think I still have about 350 MB of free space.
Disable the hibernation feature. Command Prompt (As Administrator): Code: powercfg -h off This will save you a gig or two.
Something must be amiss. Checked my Windows folder (hovered) and it said files larger than 47.4MB... click properties (it took a little bit for it to determine size) and it says 13.1G (x64). Click on drive properties and it says 13.3G used, so this doesn't add up at all. Then clicked on program files and it did similar thing but ended up being 3.4G. Doesn't all add up at all, so it must not calculate folder sizes until queried. So total size on HD is bound to be wrong.