How to clean up the Thumbnail or Icon Cache?

Question

I'm trying to delete the thumbnail cache via the following command:

DEL /F /S /Q /A %LocalAppData%\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer\thumbcache_*.db

I execute the statement as administrator and before of that I end the explorer.exe.

But I always get an access denied error.

What can I do about that? It's Windows 10.

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Nov 12 '16 at 13:42

Use cleanmgr.exe also Elevated. Either via the GUI or with /sageset /sagerun options. This may be automated via registry settings and a batch/script. I just yesterday posted one

Here's a reduced version of the PowerShell script

#Requires -RunAsAdministrator
$SageSet = "StateFlags0099"
$Base = "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\VolumeCaches\"
$Locations= @(
    "Thumbnail Cache"
)
ForEach($Location in $Locations) {
    Set-ItemProperty -Path $($Base+$Location) -Name $SageSet -Type DWORD -Value 2 -ea silentlycontinue | Out-Null
}
# do the cleanup . have to convert the SageSet number
$Args = "/sagerun:$([string]([int]$SageSet.Substring($SageSet.Length-4)))"
Start-Process -Wait "$env:SystemRoot\System32\cleanmgr.exe" -ArgumentList $Args -WindowStyle Hidden
# Removw the Stateflags
ForEach($Location in $Locations)
{
    Remove-ItemProperty -Path $($Base+$Location) -Name $SageSet -Force -ea silentlycontinue | Out-Null
}

How to clean up the Thumbnail or Icon Cache?

1 Answers1