Windows 10 and Temp Storage...The Saga...

I've been described by friends as being frugal. I have a tendency to try to assess my needs and buy what is appropriate for those needs. Thus, since I'm pretty much retired, I decided that I didn't really need an expensive computer. I needed a basic hobby computer. If you haven't bought a computer recently, you might not have noticed that the prices have come down considerably. The laptop I'm typing on at the moment is a Dell that cost just $200...a real steal!

The deal with these computers is that you need to watch the amount of storage you have in case an update comes along. Clearing the storage is easy. There are a few methods to do the task. Here is one.

1. Click the Start button, pick Settings, and then pick System to display a menu. 
2. Click Storage. The pane on the right updates.
3. Click This PC (C:). The Storage Usage pane opens. 
4. Scroll down and click Temporary files. The Temporary files pane opens.
5. Click buttons to delete temporary files.

I did fine the first few weeks. However, I began to notice that as I cleaned out the storage, Windows 10 was missing some of the files. At first, it was 50 KB that got left in the file, and then a bit more the next time. I kept clicking and wondering where these files were and why they were not going away. This mounting problem continued until I no longer had enough room for the system to install updates.

This situation of course meant I had to go looking for a solution, which wasn't all that easy to find. Here's what I found that worked for me.

1. Open File Explorer (the folder icon on the task bar at the bottom of your screen). 
2. In the menu on the left, click This PC. The pane to the right updates.
3. Double click OS (C:). The pane on the right updates.
4. Double click Users. The pane on the right updates to show system users. My system has ptrem and Public.
5. Double click your user name (ptrem in my case). A list of files appears.
6. In the address bar, click at the end of your user name and type \AppData\. A drop-down list opens. 
7. Click Local. The Local folder opens.
   (The entire path looks like this: C:\Users\ptrem\AppData\Local)
8. Click the Temp folder. The Temp folder opens.
9. Select all of the contents (Ctrl + A), and then press the Delete button on your keyboard.
   You may not be able to delete all of the files. If a message appears telling you that a file is in use, click the Skip button in the message. 
10. To see the results, in the pane on the left, click This PC. The pane to the right updates.
11. Look at  OS (C:). You should see more free space on the drive.

When I finally found this solution and completed the steps, the system deleted 13,000 plus temporary files from my system and I was able to update the system. So, if you're having storage issues on a Windows 10 system with limited storage, you might want to see if this helps you manage the space better.