Windows 7 - Thumbnail Cache - Clear and Reset

**Brink**

How to Clear and Reset the Thumbnail Cache in Windows 7

Information

By default Windows 7 stores the images for thumbnail previews in cache memory so that it can redisplay the images quickly each time you reopen a folder in Windows Explorer.

This will show you how you to clear the thumbnail cache to reset it. Deleting the thumbnails in the cache forces Windows 7 to reload the thumbnail picture views into the cache as needed as you open folders.

The thumbnail cache .db files are located in the hidden system folder location below:

C:\Users\User-Name\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer

Note

You may want to clear the thumbnail cache if the Windows Explorer thumbnail pictures have become corrupted and not displaying properly, or the thumbnail cache file has become to large and you want to clear some hard disk space.

Here's How:

1. Open Disk Cleanup.

2. Check the Thumbnails box and click on OK. (See screenshot below)

3. Click on the Delete Files button. (See screenshot below)

4. Disk Cleanup will now clear the thumbnail cache and close.

That's it,
Shawn

Related Tutorials

**Captain Zero** · 05-22-2009

Yet another awesome tutorial. Kudos Brink!

**Brink** · 05-22-2009

You're welcome Captain Zero. Thank you.

**Jeff P** · 01-13-2010

Shawn:

That is nice and simple ... it just doesn't seem to work. I watch the folder where the cache files are stored, they get deleted alright but then they almost immediately reappear (within 5-10 seconds). When I reopen the folder where I was trying to refresh the thumbnails, the old thumbnails (which do not match the actual files that were edited) are still there.

I assume there is some setting that needs to change so that the old thumbnail files do not just get immediately restored and the OS is forced to create new ones as folders get opened. Do you know what change is needed?

Thanks.

Jeff

**Brink** · 01-13-2010

Hello Jeff, and welcome to Seven Forums.

You might see if using the free program CCleaner to delete the thumbnail cache in Windows 7 may work better for you instead.

Thumbnail Cache - Clear and Reset-ccleaner.jpg

Hope this helps,
Shawn

**Jeff P** · 01-13-2010

Shawn:

Thanks for the reply. I downloaded CCleaner and used it just to try to fix the Thumbnail Cache. I don't see any changes to the thumbnails in the folders. They still do not match the picture in the file. Do you have any ideas why these thumbnails will not refresh? Thanks!

Jeff

**Brink** · 01-14-2010

Jeff,

You might also see if rebuilding the icon cache may help, but try running a sfc /scannow command to.

**Jeff P** · 01-14-2010

Shawn:

The rebuild of the icon cache followed by a flushing of the thumbnail files using disk clean didn't make a difference. The thumbnails remain as they were.

When I ran the sfc /scannow command I did get some errors that could not be repaired. The log file is attached (if you have time and the inclination to scan it). the errors appear to be related to printing so I don't think they are relevant to the problem at hand (but I'm not a Window systems guy).

Any ideas?

Jeff

**Brink** · 01-15-2010

Jeff,

You might see if toggling thumbnail previews off an on may reset it to show properly afterwards.

No, the tcpmon.ini file wouldn't have anything to do with this. However, here is a clean copy of it below to replace your corrupted one with. You would just need to take ownership of your C:\Windows\System32\tcpmon.ini file and "Allow" "Full Control" of it to your user account, then copy and replace it with the new one.

**Jeff P** · 01-15-2010

Shawn:

I believe a co-worker pointed me to the real problem. There is a thumbnail image embedded within the jpeg file that matches the original uncropped image. Flushing the the thumbnail cache will never fix the issue I have because Windows will just reload the original picture from the original, uncropped thumbnail stored within the cropped image. I need to physically go into the jpeg file and figure out how to rewrite the thumbnail to match the current form of the image. So its googling I go ....

I do want to thank you for all of your help. If you do have ideas about where I might find a utility that can automatically rewrite the internal thumbnail file to match the cropped version of the image I'd love to hear them.

Take care.

Jeff

Windows 7 - Thumbnail Cache - Clear and Reset

Thumbnail Cache - Clear and Reset

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