Content.IE5 folder

[Owned]

So I was browsing my pc and noticed one of my drives was filling up while I had not installed anyting on there in recent times that should have filled it up as much as it did.

I did some digging and went through the following path to find where all the files were stored: C:\Users\MyUser\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5

this required some tampering with checking and unchecking boxes to find the right folders becouse it dead ended multiple times.

 

Now my question is does anyone know what the folder does and what it contains? can I just delete it to free up space or will that have consequences for my pc? I'd really like to clean it out as it contains about 50gb of files that I have no clue of how they got there other then that they came from browsing the internet and it saving the files. It contains images from sites like world of tanks for example.

[RedBaird]

That should be your Internet Explorer version 5 Temporary Internet files.  (Uh, it seems that IE kept using that folder name after IE 5
 
IE has settings that allow you to delete those files.  Let me check my IE settings..
 
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I have an IE 11 browser (among others) with Windows 10.
 
In the Internet Options | Settings, it has "Browsing History", with another Settings Tab.
 
That settings opens a "Website Data Settings", which has Temporary Internet Files tab.   That page has a "Disk Space to Use" section, where I have set mine to the 250MB recommended (max 1024 MB).  If you have 50GB stored and 1GB is the max, there may be some other sort of problem.
 
If you have IE 5 or not Win10, then I suppose that your control-views will be different.
 
The point of this is that you can set limits in IE on how much HD-space to use for Temp Internet files.  I would not use the "Delete" as that would lose all passwords, cookies, history, etc, etc.
 
Bottom Line : If you set the file-storage-limit to 500Mb, then the extra 49.5 GB should be freed up.  The IE installation should have come with a default limit.
 
 
ADDED:  Just found a forum post where somebody was trying to move their IE 11 files under Win10 from "c:\users\(user)\appdata\local\microsoft\windows\temporary internet files\content.ie5", two days ago.     

Edited February 19, 2017 by RedBaird

[Owned]

The issue seems to be that the folder they say the files will get stored in has only 1mb of files present, the rest are in a hidden folder that doesn't show up and thus are not counted. Im not sure if it sends files from multiple browsers becouse I mainly use firefox and it seems only internet explorer stores its files there, which would be weird as I rarely use internet explorer and the image files I found would be ones I recently saw on firefox... I will tamper with it a bit and see how it works out

[RedBaird]

I think that there are software tools out there that will let you examine hidden folders.  

 

You could try that folder-tree display program to find clues as to where the 50GB is.  I think.

[Owned]

i found the 50gb as it was in the Content.IE5 folder, the main issue i had is what will the effect be when i remove it. I asked my brother who knows more about computers than I do and he suggested to just remove it. By doing so I freed up the 50gb space. He is confused by it aswell becouse the folder doesnt seem to exist at all except when you add it to the directory line manually. The only functional solution I currently have would be to clean it up every once in a while.

[RedBaird]

See what your IE maximum temp internet files maximum is supposed to be.

 

I read other posts on forums saying that their "limiter" didn't work.

 

 

BTW, what is your OS?

Edited February 19, 2017 by RedBaird
BTW

[Owned]

im running windows 7 64bit, dont know the exact version I run.

 

The default limit for both firefox and internet explorer was 350mb max. But as I said, appareantly it doesnt register properly and just goes over the limit and does whatever it pleases

[DoubleDragon]

You may need to disable the cache in the registry. If settings aren't working while using normal windows sign in to the built in administrator account or use safe mode this is a known issue with 64bit systems to be over secure and registry entree's don't apply from window modules. My 64bit two cents worth lol

[RedBaird]

im running windows 7 64bit, dont know the exact version I run.

 

The default limit for both firefox and internet explorer was 350mb max. But as I said, appareantly it doesnt register properly and just goes over the limit and does whatever it pleases

 

My win10 does not allow File Explorer (or a DOS box with Admin) to enter those areas, as DoubleD says below.  I think that I used to be able to enter those folders and manually prune them in Win7 pro.  I can plug in my old win7 ssd and boot from that.  I could also try booting from a LiveCD Linux and see if it would allow me to examine those folders.

You may need to disable the cache in the registry. If settings aren't working while using normal windows sign in to the built in administrator account or use safe mode this is a known issue with 64bit systems to be over secure and registry entree's don't apply from window modules. My 64bit two cents worth lol

Yes, I was reading some not-FA forum posts about editing the registry to fix the over-the-limit problem that some people have have.    There was much confusion among the posters there.  

 

I also saw something about using a "deep" Windows command to change the permissions for admin accounts so that they could access the Temporary Internet folders and others blocked like that.  The normal permissions methods don't work and the boxes that would allow this access are grayed out.  

 

I will have to try the Safe Mode and see what I can "get away with" there.  Safe Mode seems to be a bit harder to get into with win10, too.

Edited February 19, 2017 by RedBaird