How do I clean junk off my computer?

[pratibha91]

Hello Everyone,

Should I download any third-party software or use disk cleanup in windows that will help to get rid of this?

Every thought will be appreciated!!

Thanks in Advance

 

[noiseboy72]

I use CC Cleaner free edition to keep the registry and startup clean. It also does a good job of clearing out temporary files and browser histories across all installed browsers.

You can use Windows tools, it's just a bit more work!

 

[EndlessWaves]

There's very little junk on a computer.

Generally anything that can be automatically identified as being no longer needed is deleted automatically. Caches, the recycle bin and so on delete the oldest files as they need space for new ones.

They only reason to delete their contents using an external program such as disk cleanup is if you need a load of extra space briefly for something - such as installing a big update or temporarily storing a very large file.

If the space they take up is too much for whatever reason then reduce their size limit rather than force deleting them periodically.

That leaves things like log files from when the system crashed which aren't automatically deleted. After a while they become irrelevant and could be considered junk but the number and size of such files rarely grows beyond tiny. My computer has three years old and totalling up all the ones I know comes to a couple of hundred files and a few megabytes which will have no effect on performance. And I probably experiment and install stuff more than most, so I'd expect the normal count to be even lower.


Basically these are troubleshooting tools for use when you have a problem, not maintenance tools you want to be running regularly.

 

[noiseboy72]

There's very little junk on a computer.

Generally anything that can be automatically identified as being no longer needed is deleted automatically. Caches, the recycle bin and so on delete the oldest files as they need space for new ones.

They only reason to delete their contents using an external program such as disk cleanup is if you need a load of extra space briefly for something - such as installing a big update or temporarily storing a very large file.

If the space they take up is too much for whatever reason then reduce their size limit rather than force deleting them periodically.

That leaves things like log files from when the system crashed which aren't automatically deleted. After a while they become irrelevant and could be considered junk but the number and size of such files rarely grows beyond tiny. My computer has three years old and totalling up all the ones I know comes to a couple of hundred files and a few megabytes which will have no effect on performance. And I probably experiment and install stuff more than most, so I'd expect the normal count to be even lower.


Basically these are troubleshooting tools for use when you have a problem, not maintenance tools you want to be running regularly.

Evidence would suggest that unless you set up automated deletion within the various app and programs you use, file will build up. Below is a screen shot of my daughter's laptop:

That's around 20Gb of unused, unwanted files that will slow down the average PC, increase file fragmentation and the user experience when using browsers etc. This is just a month's worth.

You can of course automate clearing your browser history on logging out, emptying the recycle bin on a regular basis etc. but this is a pretty typical out of the box Windows 10 PC.

If you are very regimented in your approach to file deletion and management, then these tools are not so important, but for the average user they do show improvements after running them.

 

[EndlessWaves]

That's around 20Gb of unused, unwanted files that will slow down the average PC, increase file fragmentation and the user experience when using browsers etc. This is just a month's worth.

Most of that isn't unused.

The recycle bin we're all familiar with and if you don't want it to store 18GB worth of deleted files you can simply right click it, open properties and change the size.

Cookies and cache are both part of the normal function of a web browser. Deleting the cache files will cause it to take longer to load web pages as it has to redownload the images rather than loading them from the cache and deleting the cookies will cause websites to loose set preferences and require you to log in again.

Cookies expire after a set time and get deleted and cache has an upper disk space limit where old stuff is deleted to make room for the new. Most browsers offer you the ability to disable cookies and many let you set the size of their cache.

Prefetch data is a cache for windows use to help speed up the loading of programs. IIRC it's got a limited number of entries and the oldest ones get deleted by the OS when a slot is required for newer ones.

So the only genuinely unused files in your list are 12 memory dumps, 50 log files and 86 error reports. And CCleaner may be counting logs that will be re-created immediately as they're overwritten every time the OS or a program runs.

The log files and error reports take up hardly any space at all. Memory dumps are created in fairly serious system crashes, blue screens and similar, which are fairly rare these days. I believe Windows only stores one big (kernal) memory dump at a time, overwriting the old one, so that size will only grow by new Minidumps if she continues to experience the problems that cause them to be created.

I've checked my machine and there are no memory dump or minidump files after three years of use.

So there's maybe 300MB and a couple of hundred junk files. The rest are normal temporary files that are managed by their respective programs. The'll take up a certain maximum space and then grow no more.

 

[WildFowler]

Hello Everyone,

Should I download any third-party software or use disk cleanup in windows that will help to get rid of this?

Every thought will be appreciated!!

Thanks in Advance

It all depends which operating system you are using and what you want to remove. If you mean the unwanted apps installed with Windows10, I would suggest you google search for a free app called "bloatbox". I hope this helps in the meantime.

 

[JulianDS]

I’m a big fan of ccleaner (piriform cleaner)
been using it for over a decade, maybe two!

 

[Jaquliney]

By using CCleaner software you can clear junks. I use these last 2years and fully satisfied with it and most importantly it is free software that clears out temporary files and browser histories across all installed browsers.