I own a Lenovo Thinkpad X1 Carbon laptop. It’s a great laptop; sturdy too. Recently, I came across a folder called SWTOOLS, found in the root of my C drive. Its size was 4GB and has over 4000 items in it. So, what’s inside? I found these folders:

• antivirus
• APPS
• DRIVERS
• LenovoWelcome
• LSSB
• MISC
• OSFIXES
• readyapps
• skype
• SplashTopStreamer
• WindowsLive_2011

and these files:

• 67PRO
• ENG
• LenovoBrand.ini
• LenovoType.ini
• MODULES.LOG
• SP1
• W7PRO
• W764

I upgraded from Windows 7 to Windows 10 and I choose to remove everything from my computer (so I had a fresh install of Win 10). But apparently, that didn’t happen. These files include what version of Windows 7 I had (Pro), the architecture (x64), that my machine was in English (ENG) and also that a service pack was installed (SP1).

The folders contained information about what software was installed and what drivers for each hardware.

So this folder contains installers from various pieces of software that I had previously installed. Windows likely has kept these files to recover Windows, in case of an OS failure for example, so I can later re-install everything.

I suggest to keep a backup of this folder somewhere and then to delete the folder.