Disk Cleanup has found 35.5 GB of temporary files; how can I see them?

I ran Disk Cleanup and it found 35.5 GB of "Temporary Files."

I thought this was odd.

Before continuing, I checked my disk usage. I have used 48.3 GB of my 80 GB partition (actual size 74.2 GB). I doubt I only have 12.8 GB of "real" files and the rest are "temporary," but maybe.

I took a look with WinDirStat and I don't see any one folder in the root directory (C:\) that could contain the entire 35.5 GB. Not C:\Windows, not C:\Users, not C:\Program Files, etc.

C:\.TemporaryItems is empty because I cleaned up with CCleaner already.

SO ANYWAY... is there some way to see exactly what Disk Cleanup is thinking is a "temporary" file? Can I trust that it knows what it's doing and delete them without checking first?

I'm afraid this is only a partial answer to your question. Some of those 35.5GB files could include system files, non-system files, programs and features, and restore points and shadow copies. The restore points and shadow copies can easily add up.

Because these temp files are kinda scattered around the hard drive, there's not just one central location where they're stored. When you open Disk Cleanup you can highlight one of the file areas to clean up and then click the View Files button. That would at least show you what files in that particular category would be cleaned. And it's been my experience that whatever Disk Cleanup recommends is perfectly safe to delete.



And this tutorial may give you some additional info.

Disk Cleanup - Open and Use

Delete files using Disk Cleanup

marsmimar said:

When you open Disk Cleanup you can highlight one of the file areas to clean up and then click the View Files button. That would at least show you what files in that particular category would be cleaned.

This doesn't work for "Temporary files" unfortunately.

Thanks for the advice. I decided to go ahead and clean up. Doesn't seem to have blown up yet. 35 GB of temp files on a system with 12 GB of non-temp files is silly.

...scratch that...

I waited for it to clean up, re-opened it, and it still showed 35 GB of temp files. I ran it again, opened it again, and still 35 GB of temp files.

I'm not sure what's happening now.

Sometimes 3rd party tools give better/more functionality than native Windows tools. Two such products regularly recommended on this Forum are CCleaner and Temp File Cleaner by OldTimer. (NOTE: if TFC is used you must reboot to finish clearing any in-use temp files.)

CCleaner - PC Optimization and Cleaning - Free Download

TFC - Temp File Cleaner by OldTimer - Geeks to Go Forums

I already used CCleaner just before I used Disk Cleanup and found 35 GB of temp files.

I tried TFC just now, and it reported cleaning out 7 GB of files.

I rebooted, opened Disk Cleanup, and it still shows 35 GB of temp files. :/ I ran Disk Cleanup and tried again. Still 35 GB of temp files.

Does anyone have any idea why this might be? What might create such a large amount of temp data? Why does Disk Cleanup find it, but not clean it up?

I would love to, but for the life of me I can't figure out how to get my Mac to boot from the resultant USB key.

My roommate's Windows netbook will boot from it (though he has 64-bit windows and I have 32-bit, so I can't actually use it there, but it boots). My Mac doesn't offer it as an option in the EFI boot menu. I get OS X on the internal drive, I get Windows on the internal drive, I can get it to boot Mac OS on USB, I can get it to boot from a Mac DVD, but I have no clue, after much googling, how to get this to boot.

EDIT: I'm starting a full scan with Symantec Endpoint Protection and going to bed. I'll try again tomorrow.