Safe to delete Temporary Files?

[aege125]

I did a Disk Cleanup scan (Windows utility) and i was wondering if it is safe to delete the Temporary files (not internet) because its taking up 4.5 million KB.

Does it automatically delete overtime? If I delete now, will it affect my applications/programs/games?

 

[Daveskater]

if it's that big then i'd delete it

it might cause some programs to clear the "recently opened files" thingy but other than that i don't think it'll affect your programs

 

[Spyder_1386]

4.5 million kb??!?! lol, thats 4 gigs of temporary files..... lol, did you install quake 4 in there?? if u havn't actually installed something into that folder, i'd get rid of it. Its taking up space and slowing down your pc....

Spyder_1386

 

[evilfantasy]

CCleaner (crap cleaner) is a very safe program to use for quick effective cleaning.

There is a reliable registry cleaner built in also.

 

[sghiznaneck]

If you have that much junk in your temp files, how much junk is in your Windows Prefetch folder (assuming you are running XP)?

 

[Bobbye]

Temp files are usually files left over from a setup. Sometimes they get cleaned up, but yours should never have been allowed to get to large.

Do a search for .tmp files on the system. Select them all> Delete.

The only exception is if you have recently in last day or two installed new software. If so, that file should be allowed to remain for up to a week.

Are you doing regular maintenance of the system, to include the disc cleanup, Error Check, defrag, scans with AV and at least two spyware/adware programs? Possibly you are doing it frequently enough.

Bobbye

 

[evilfantasy]

Or just run CCleaner to get rid of temp, prefetch, index .dat, memory dumps and on and on and on.

Why make a huge task out of it when it is taken care of automatically with CCleaner.

 

[howard_hopkinso]

Cleaning the pre-fetch folder is not necessary. Windows manages it automatically, dropping out entries that are old or unused. In addition to making your frequently used programs load slower, it will also INCREASE bootup time because Windows has to re-copy all the page files you "cleaned out".

Full article HERE.

In other words, don`t set Ccleaner to clean out the prefetch folder.

Other, than that, Ccleaner will do an excellent job of getting rid of junk files and freeing up space.

I agree with evilfantasy that using Ccleaner is the quickest and easiest way.

You should also take a look at this thread HERE.

Edit: More prefetch info can be found HERE.

Regards Howard

 

[Bobbye]

I do not agree with the necessity for keeping the Prefetch files. I have seen sites there that I "never" went back to! I delete the Prefetch files and have not experienced any problem from doing do.

 

[howard_hopkinso]

You are of course entitled to your opinion. However, it is known that emptying the prefetch folder does actually degrade system performance, if only temporary and is totally unnecessary.

See the articles below.

http://www.edbott.com/weblog/archives/000743.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prefetcher

http://www.edbott.com/weblog/archives/000024.html

http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdnmag/issues/01/12/XPKernel/default.aspx Scroll down to Prefetch.

I used to clean out the prefetch folder myself, until I read the articles.

Regards Howard

 

[evilfantasy]

Great information Howard.

Thanks for the heads up.

 

[Tedster]

it is totally safe, however Howard is correct. It will take longer to fetch pages as you will have none to refer to. I generally also do not delete firefox cookies.

 

[Bobbye]

Is there some reason why you don't delete Firefox Cookies? I find it the easiest of the browsers.

Tools> Options> Privacy> Show Cookies> highlight and click on Remove. Gone!

I delete all but the few I keep on for ID.

 

[howard_hopkinso]

I delete all but the few I keep on for ID.

Yeah me too. Except, I use the option in Ccleaner to keep certain cookies.

Regards Howard

 

[SNGX1275]

Is there some reason why you don't delete Firefox Cookies? I find it the easiest of the browsers.

Tools> Options> Privacy> Show Cookies> highlight and click on Remove. Gone!

In Opera its easier, Tools -> Delete Private Data -> Click delete.

The first time you do it there is one more step, of checking what types of data you want deleted. It remembers after that so its down to 3 mouse clicks after the very first time. Still even with that step it is 1 step shorter than FF, and after the first time its 2 steps shorter.

 

[Jase123]

in Firefox you can just go to tools and then in the drop down click clear private data. Easy! lol.

Regards Jase

 

[SNGX1275]

Guess its about the same:

Its a little more serious/less customizable in Safari:

 

[Jase123]

Yes it is SNGX1275 lol.

I've only tried Opera once and i preferred firefox over it lol.

Here are some screenshots for clearing private data in firefox:-

After clicking that it will then lead you to this:-

Regards Jase

 

[Tedster]

yeah, I hate re-entering info all the time. Cookies for the most part are harmless. If I do visit some nebulous sites, I delete my cookies. And yes, I am extremely familiar with FF.

 

[SNGX1275]

Here are some screenshots for clearing private data in firefox

My screen shot of Gran Paridiso is actually a OS X version of FF 3. I would have taken a shot of Bon Echo, which is an OS X version of FF 2, but it looked identical and I already had GP open.

Here is what you see in Opera when you click delete private data:

 

[var_1986]

go to start> Run> %temp% > select all (ctrl+a) and delet all files.