While annoying, it’s not that big a deal. I mean, you chose to run Windows (or someone at your company did) which means “lean” or “efficient” were never really serious concerns from the get-go.
If you want a lean OS that’s super efficient in terms of disk space you go with some form of Linux or a BSD. Windows would never even be a consideration (which is another reason why Linux market share on servers is so, so much larger than Windows).
A pretty decent 1TB SSD costs $60. That means 9GB costs about $0.54. It’s even less if you use the old style, spinning rust disks.
While that’s true enough now, windows has in the past been viable as a “small” or “space efficient” choice. Windows 2000 and even XP could be installed and operate in less than 300megs of room, while being able to also run windows software. A linux distro (or bsd) configured to do the same was about the same size without the same level of compatibility. It really comes down to what you need to do.
