[Myth] Cleaning out the prefetch folder will accelerate Windows

Last update on August 3, 2009 04:04 PM by fahd_zboot
Published by jak58

Cleaning out the prefetch folder will accelerate Windows




Myth


It is recommended that you periodically clean out the prefetch folder to improve the performance of your Windows.

Reality


False, consider it as a bad idea to perform such operation.

Explanation


Microsoft XP has a Prefetch directory running below the windows root directory,containing .pf files (list of pages to load).
It contains In layman's terms when you run a program, Window XP will automatically make a list of files it thinks you might need. This is also applicable when you are running a set of programs, while starting (initializing) an application Windows will search for files you will need for the other ones.

This is also you when you turn on your PC to optimize the start up of your Windows XP.

Conclusion


It is totally unnecessary to clean out the prefetch folder; this will result in degrading the performance of your Windows

Windows will automatically recreate the data and the amount of files created is limited to 128 files in order to save disk space. Note that Windows will not portion of copy files in the prefetch directory (each file exist as an index).

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