login123

Have read many posts, also the beginners guide. Cannot find the answer to the following question. If I have overlooked it, many apologies. Does ccleaner overwrite the various index.dat files as it deletes them at startup? Couple of other members have concluded that it does not, but I can't tell from the beginners guide. The index.dat files left after restart are shiny new ones, no information in them, but were the old ones overwritten or simply deleted? Thank you.

Happened to me last year after installing a Sony DVD burner and the Nero OEM software that came with it. All the icons for .dat files turned into the little green one associated with some other application, Nero I think. Couldn't fix it, everything worked OK, so just ignored it until the next time I redid the hard drive. Happened again when I installed Arcsoft PhotoStudio. Right now, the icon is the one for ArcSoft, but they open with the windows picture and fax viewer unless I select a different one.

Thanks for the tip about eusing, I will get it and try it. Happy new year.

Seems to be concern about secure deletion. auto101234 and Green Eyes. If I understand correctly, ccleaner will overwrite a file 1, 3, or 7 times, users choice, more overwrites is slower. Am I right about that? If so, that means that without extraordinary effort, the file contents are not recoverable, but some indicators are still present. The dos batch files shown in the forums seem to only delete the target files, so probably the ccleaner default at startup would be more secure, but would still leave indications that a file had been there. Moving the (overwritten) file does the same thing. . .indicators are still present. Two possibilities: use another developers free space wiper, or build one into ccleaner. As a rule they are sloooooow, start'em up, check on'em tomorrow. But, they would remove the tracks. Don't know of any free ones. For ccleaner, may I make 2 suggestions: 1. that a free space wiper be incorporated, and 2. that the Peter Guttman 35 pass overwrite scheme be included as an option in the future. Thanks. Have a happy and safe new year.

Thank you for the welcome, Glenn. I do have the "view all. . ." option checked. In windows explorer, when I click on temporary internet files (TIF), I can see files, etc, but what I can't see is the index.dat file that resides there. If I delete all the visible files, then right click and select "properties", I am told that there are 200 files and 6 folders, but they aren't visible. The properties reply varies with how long I have been on the 'net. If, however, I copy the TIF folder into "my documents", I can see them all. What is in there right now is: a folder "Content.IE5", four folders with random names like 4Q1OREHZ, a desktop.ini file, and an index.dat. Inside the folder 4Q1OREHZ et. al. are many files from the last 'net session. The index.dat file will open with notepad, it is a history of 'net use. Same process: copy and open, works for the Cookies folder. The History folder, however is ORNERY, I'm tellin ya. It shows "today", "yesterday", "lst week", etc, but it also has several subfolders, and several index.dat files, and you can't see them no matter where you copy it to. However, if you copy it to "my documents", Winzip it, then click on the zip file in the right explorer pane, all the files in there are visible and openable (is that a word?). Anyhow, ccleaner finds and deletes them all. A before and after comparison shows that after running ccleaner at startup, the only ones to be found are the newly created ones, nothing in them. I do have a question: Can you see the index.dat folders in TIF or in history without going through this copy etc procedure? If you can, I'd sure like to know how. Thanks again for the welcome words.

First, from the newest kid on the block, may you have a happy and safe new year in 2007. I have just registered and am looking forward to participating. Just used ccleaner, worked great. The History folder in win xp is ornery, won't let you look at it, properties inquiry shows a bunch of files which are invisible, dos cursor just sits there and blinks. . .ORNERY. To get a look at everything in the history file, copy it to a folder, then use winzip (ver. 9 on my computer) to compress it, then double click on the zip file in the right pane of windows explorer. This will show all the archived files. Double clicking on any of them will open it with the associated application (notepad for me). Same thing works for the temporary internet files folder and the cookies folder. You probably don't have to compress them, just copy them and click on them. Have just found out that some old information is still true: 1. When win xp creates the cookies\index.dat file at startup, it is 16 kb in size 2. The other 2 (temporary internet files and history) are created at 32 kb. 2a. Wrong. The default in . . .history\history.ie5 is 16 kb also. edited 2007 01 Jan So, if your index.dat file shows up larger that 16 or 32 kb, it isn't "new". Again, happy new year, be safe, and may God bless.