Strange files in Temp folder?

[Hans Näslund]

I am beginning to get short of space on my hard disk, so I am looking for
files and folders to be deleted.

In the Temp folder there are 16 files, each a little over 1 GB, all named _Z
plus 6 digits (e.g. _Z958052 etc). One such file seems to be created each
day. What are they for? Do I need all of them, or can I delete soem or all
of them?

 

[DL]

Delete them, they are usually generated by App instalations, also when using
an App.
You can also run Disk Cleanup, to remove tmp files

 

[George Hester]

You got something going on there. You should never have temp files on the order of 1GB. If you do you either have a misbehaving application or one in which the developers should be whipped upside the head.

How about the modified date? Are they created daily?

Yes you can delete any file in a temp directory. If you get an error that just means the file is being used at the moment. A reboot and then try should take care of it. If it don't then there is something running at startup that is using them. I'd say try opening them in Notepad and see if there is any human understandable characters in the file but 1GB, no don't try that. It may take 10hrs to display. In Windows 95/98/ME Notepad would gripe.

 

[Gary Smith]

Yes you can delete any file in a temp directory. If you get an error

that just means the file is being used at the moment. A reboot and then
try should take care of it. If it don't then there is something running
at startup that is using them. I'd say try opening them in Notepad and
see if there is any human understandable characters in the file but 1GB,
no don't try that. It may take 10hrs to display. In Windows 95/98/ME
Notepad would gripe.

Some install programs leave things in the Temp folder to be used on
rebooting the system. The safest way to clean the Temp folder is to
reboot, and then delete the contents of the Temp folder before starting
any installs or applications. Any file that's not busy under those
circumstances is safe to delete.