[micci]

I noticed a problem with Spy Bot Search and Destroy a few months ago. IT was spending days canning Windows Defender history. I'd never heard of this programme and did not know that my machine had been running it, so I googled it and then attempted to delete the hsitory. Unfortunately whenever I click the "history" tab on Windows Defender App, the programme stops responding. I can only assume that this is because of the sheer volume of the folder. I disabled Defender after that to prevent it storing more scan history.

A few weeks ago I decided to have another go at deleting this history after trying to speed up my machine using error check and defrag tools. I noticed that I have over 9 million files on my hard disc, too many for Window's own tools to deal with apparently, any maintenance I try to do takes days if not weeks (I usually cancel the process after two days in frustration)

More Googling lead me to find Piriform's Defraggler and CCleaner. I have been running CCleaner continuously for 4 days, it is stuck at 88% deleting Windows Defender Scan History, so far it has deleted over 30GB worth of files relating to Windows Defender history, however when I try to run Defraggler I can see that my hard drive still has over 9 million files, most of which are from Windows Defender history. Defraggler always crashes at 50%. Again I can only assume that this is because of the sheer volume of files on my hard drive.

Apart from running CCleaner for however many days or weeks it will take is there any other way I can remove Windows Defender Scan History files from my PC? I an running Vista Home Edition.

Many thanks in advance for your help. This has been driving me mad for months now.

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Hi

Did you try do delete the files running in Safe Mode?

Windows isn't very good deleting files from a folder full of them, I normally use the good old Command Line open the Command Line as Administrator (Tutorial)
use the cd command to change the working folder and the del filename command to delete the files. If you want to delete all the files inside a folder you can type del . inside the folder.

[SleepyDude]

Hi

Did you try do delete the files running in Safe Mode?

Windows isn't very good deleting files from a folder full of them, I normally use the good old Command Line open the Command Line as Administrator (Tutorial)
use the cd command to change the working folder and the del filename command to delete the files. If you want to delete all the files inside a folder you can type del . inside the folder.

[micci]

Defender won't open in safe mode. I just get an error code.

[SleepyDude]

Defender won't open in safe mode. I just get an error code.

Exactly, try to delete the files manually or using CCleaner if you prefer.