[jeh35]

I’ve been asked to try to debug a senior’s XP desktop PC. It’s only a couple of years old but at the time it was bought the owners asked that as much as possible from their previous machine be kept, including staying with XP. I suspect, but don’t know for certain, that this may have been done by imaging the four partitions on the hdd from their previous machine. Certainly the partition arrangements are very similar to those I know they had before.

I got called in a couple of weeks ago when the computer started to have trouble handling emails. Soon found that its 32 GB C: partition, containing Windows, only had a few MB spare space. In turn that was because the Windows\Temp folder contained 18 GB of unwanted rubbish dating back a long time. Most of this was from nearly 300 pairs of files named (HHHHHH.tmp (~62.5 MB) and hhhhhh.dmp (225 kb)), where HHHHHH and hhhhhh are strings of hex characters, nearly always six characters but occasionally five. The two files in each pair always have the same time stamp but their names are different. Deleting them fixed the immediate problem, however it is set to recur. When I went back a week later another dozen or so file pairs had appeared, already nearly a GB.

Initial testing suggested that these files were left whenever IE or Firefox browsers were closed; however last night I established that they are left behind whenever the OS (XP3, fully updated afaik) is shut down. The .tmp files are mostly about 62.500 MB, plus or minus only around 50 or 60 kB, although a few get as large as 63 and as small as 61 MB. I’m guessing that the difference could something to do with the length of the session.

Looking at the files with a text editor didn't provide any useful info, and a registry cleaner didn’t report anything untoward. Has anyone seen this sort of thing and, importantly, can you suggest what I should try?

The two obvious cures are to re-install Windows – which I’m reluctant to attempt because of the complexity of the stuff on the machine – and to ask the owner not to turn the machine off between sessions. However there’s no way she’ll do that.

Any suggestions will be gratefully received

TIA John

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Install CCleaner. Set it up so it doesn't deltete things they want to keep, like Cookies, History, Windows Explorer MRU, etc.

Have them run it once a week. That will keep all the areas of the computer clean that temporary files collect in. Tell then to run only the Cleaner part, nothing else (the whisk broom icon).

See next post ... Thanks

[Ztruker]

Install CCleaner. Set it up so it doesn't deltete things they want to keep, like Cookies, History, Windows Explorer MRU, etc.

Have them run it once a week. That will keep all the areas of the computer clean that temporary files collect in. Tell then to run only the Cleaner part, nothing else (the whisk broom icon).

See next post ... Thanks

[dsenette]

we would really prefer that you don't use CCleaner. there are several things that can go wrong if you press the wrong button. i know that ZTrucker said to only do the temp file cleanup, but TBH, if someone goes pressing buttons on their own then things can get messed up. CCleaners registry tools are VERY agressive and can (and have) cause system instability to the point of making your computer unusable.

we would suggest that you use Temp File Cleaner by OldTimer instead. it ONLY cleans temp files so you don't have to worry about anything else getting mucked up.

[jeh35]

Thanks to both of you. I'll install Temp File Cleaner on the errant machine. A cleanup a couple of times a month will be ample.

Thanks again. John