Is it safe to delete Windows Update Cleanup folders/files by using the utility Disk Cleanup?

1) When using the utility Disk Cleanup on my Dell Studio 1558, by default, the following files are automatically selected to be deleted: Downloaded Program Files [0 bytes], Temporary Internet Files [217 Kb], and Thumbnails [2.01 MB]. Can the other files be selected to delete by the user (me) without damaging the PC, Programs, etc.? They are: Offline Webpages [38.0 KB], Game statistic Files [12.2 KB],Temporary Files [602 KB], and System archived Windows Error Reporting [17.0 KB], and of course Recycle Bin.

2) When using the utility Disk Cleanup there is another option whereby the user (me) can «cleanup system files». By default the utility AGAIN selected: Downloaded Program Files [0 bytes], Temporary Internet Files [217 KB ], and Thumbnails [2.01 GB]. It additionally selects: Windows Update Cleanup [6.23GB] , which looks to use ALOT of SPACE that this PC could be free of!. Is it safe to delete Windows Update Cleanup, when using Disk Cleanup, without damaging the PC, Programs, etc.? The Disk Cleanup tool warns NOT TO DELETE: Service Pack Backup files, but gives no such warning about any of the other files that can be manually selected by the user (me) to delete. Thanks, Looking To Clean Up This PC, thanks for taking time to read/ reply, Sincerely, Jim Colvin

Replies (4) 

It is safe to delete those filed with cleanup, however you may not be able to reverse any Windows updates if desired after you use Windows Update Cleanup.

If your system is functioning properly and has been for a time, then I see no reason not to clean them up. I have done this on all my systems to date.

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This is a new component that has been added to the Disk Cleanup utility by a recent Windows Update.

This option cleans out all of the outdated and redundant files that are installed in the Component Store (Winsxs folder).

Users have been complaining about the size of this folder ever since Windows 7 was first released.

It is safe to use and as you can see it will free up a lot of disk space.

You can get complete information about this new cleanup option and a brief tutorial on how to use it in the following article.

Update is available that enables you to delete outdated Windows updates by using a new option in the Disk Cleanup wizard in Windows 7 SP1:

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Dear Lead3, You sure do not have any lead in your pants when it comes to responding to help someone, thanks very much, I think that you replied to my question within 10 minutes of posting! Actually, after installing the 31 Windows Updates on 10/09/13 I do have a PC problem, Chess Titans is flashing every so often so as to show the Screen behind it (my desktop), and it’s Icon on the Taskbar will «shuffle» a bit, along with a barley readable «Chess Titans Is Not Responding» in the top left of the screen («title bar«)! So I hesitate to delete the Windows Update Cleanup just yet! I have AutoCAD 2010 and Microsoft Office 2010 on the same PC, Word has no problem, I have not been into other parts of the Suite yet. Also the Windows Sound Icon is X’d out in RED but it does work after clicking it and moving the slide. But, this may be associated to a problem that’s been going on for a year whereby not all of the Icons I select always show up there on startup. I have another User Account on the SAME PC and Chess Titans works fine there! I WONDER ABOUT THAT!

Thanks for your thoughtful and quick reply, Jim Colvin

PS When I checked if Chess Titans was working right on my other User Account (same PC) it did work. But, I got a pop up at the bottom of Bing’s page: «Canon Easy Webprint EX BHO Isn’t Compatible with Internet Explorer and is temporarily disabled.» with 2 buttons on the right of this yellow bar 1) Check for updates or 2) Leave it disabled. I have A Canon Pixma 495 printer and it’s Program had to be updated about 6 months ago, as it was wreaking havoc on my Microsoft Word 2010, but thanks to help here at the Community I got some replies, one of them was to Update the Canon Printer Program! Who would’ve thought?

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Dear Mr Vernon, Thank you very much for your prompt and thoughtful answer, I am pushed for time so I am re-iterating what I said to Lead3 (in above reply this page). Please read thru (if you have the time-LOL), AS I AM REALLY PUZZLED as to this new problem with CHESS TITANS, and my TASKBAR NOTIFICATION AREA selected Icons PROBLEM. Maybe you have a SOLUTION for these problems also.

Actually, after installing the 31 Windows Updates on 10/09/13 I do have a PC problem, Chess Titans is flashing every so often so as to show the Screen behind it (my desktop), and it’s Icon on the Taskbar will «shuffle» a bit, along with a barley readable «Chess Titans Is Not Responding» in the top left of the screen («title bar«)! So I hesitate to delete the Windows Update Cleanup just yet! I have AutoCAD and Microsoft Office 2010 on the same PC, Word has no problem, I have not been into other parts of the Suite yet. Also the Windows Sound Icon is X’d out in RED but it does work after clicking it and moving the slide. But, this may be associated to a problem that’s been going on for a year whereby not all of the Icons I select always show up there on startup. I have another User Account on the SAME PC and Chess Titans works fine there! I WONDER ABOUT THAT!

Thanks for your thoughtful and quick reply, Jim Colvin

PS When I checked if Chess Titans was working right on my other User Account (same PC) it did work. But, I got a pop up at the bottom of Bing’s page: «Canon Easy Webprint EX BHO Isn’t Compatible with Internet Explorer and is temporarily disabled.» with 2 buttons on the right of this yellow bar 1) Check for updates or 2) Leave it disabled. I have A Canon Pixma 495 printer and it’s Program had to be updated about 6 months ago, as it was wreaking havoc on my Microsoft Word 2010, but thanks to help here at the Community I got some replies, one of them was to Update the Canon Printer Program! Who would’ve thought?

Сэкономить место на диске с Microsoft Windows Update Cleanup tool.

Пространство операционной системы Windows с течением времени растёт, в основном благодаря пакетам обновлений, но также и за счёт других системных файлов и программ, которые устанавливают пользователи на свой ПК. Есть только несколько ситуаций, в которых требования к месту терпят крушение. Это может быть после того, как вы решите удалить компонент, который Вы не хотите использовать больше, запустив средство очистки диска после установки пакета обновления для удаления файлов резервной копии системы, которая создается автоматически как вариант для восстановления системы до уровня пакета обновления.

Microsoft выпустила новую утилиту для очистки диска в Windows 7, который добавляет ещё одну опцию, чтобы освободить дисковое пространство.

Обновление: Оно также интегрируется в Windows 8.1. Не ждите чудес прямо сейчас здесь, хотя. Способ запуска такой же, как и под Windows 7.

Утилита Windows Update Cleanup tool предназначена для удаления обновлений Windows из системы, которые больше не нужны.

Вы, наверное, задаетесь вопросом, почему это происходит. Все обновления Windows, сохраняются в WinSxS независимо от того, являются ли они superseeded обновлениями или нет. Это сделано, чтобы предоставить вам варианты отката для замены обновления.

Обычно это не требуется, если у вас есть тесты, чтобы убедиться, что последнее обновление не имеет каких-либо отрицательных воздействий на систему, или если вы работали с обновленным ПК в течение некоторого времени, и не заметили каких-либо проблем, вызванных новым обновлением.

Данный эффект имитирует удаление старых файлов после установки пакета обновления, которые должны быть обработаны таким же образом.

Windows Update Cleanup

Новая утилита в настоящее время доступна только на ПК под управлением Windows 7 с пакетом обновления 1. Чтобы запустить программу, выполните следующие действия:

1. Нажмите на клавиша Windows, чтобы открыть меню » Пуск».
2. Введите команду Cleanmgr, после выполнения этой команды нажмите Enter.
3. Откроется средство очистки диска.
4. Выберите диск C: (при условии, что Windows установлена на диске С:)
5. Первое, что вам нужно сделать в окне которое откроется, это нажать на кнопку «Очистить системные файлы» .
6. Это просканирует систему и добавит дополнительные параметры в инструмент очистки, которые недоступны при первом запуске.
7. Прокрутите вниз, пока не найдёте Windows Update Cleanup.
8. Этот параметр выбран по умолчанию. Рядом с ним-это объем в мегабайтах или Гигабайтах, который вы сэкономите в вашей системе, если вы включите его очистку.
9. На моей Windows 7 Pro 64-разрядной операционной системе, были перечислены 4.02 Гб данных для очистки.
10. Нажмите кнопку ОК, чтобы начать процесс.
11. Перезагрузите компьютер, чтобы завершить её работу.

Вы можете автоматизировать процесс используя параметры командной строки,которые поддерживает средство очистки диска.

1. Нажмите на клавиша Windows, введите команду cmd и нажмите return.
2. Запустите команду cleanmgr /sageset:n, чтобы сохранить параметры очистки которые требуются для использования будущих уборок в Реестре.
3. Запустите команду cleanmgr /sagerun:n для выполнения указанной задачи, используя настройки, которые вы сохранили при запуске инструмента с sageset командой.

Примечание: Замените n на целое значение между 0 и 65535.

Вывод

Новая программа Windows Update Cleanup для очистки диска-это отличное дополнение для пользователей Windows 7, так как они могут освободить много места на диске. Быстрая проверка папки Windows на моем компьютере, как выяснилось, имела объём 28.7 гигабайт до запуска новой утилиты. После перезагрузки, эта сумма уменьшилась до 24,5 Гб для папки Windows.

Top 7 Fixes to Disk Cleanup Stuck on Windows Update Cleanup [Partition Magic]

By Irene | Follow | Last Updated January 02, 2020

Summary :

Recently, many users report that they encounter Windows Update Cleanup stuck issue while running the Disk Cleanup tool in Windows OS. How to fix the issue that Disk Cleanup stuck on Windows Update cleanup? This post from MiniTool offers you some effective solutions.

Quick Navigation :

What is Windows Update Cleanup

After you install the latest updates via Windows Update, Windows will still keep the old update files on your computer, which allows you to uninstall updates if necessary. However, sometimes those files may take up a great amount of disk space, which is a waste of space if you don’t plan to uninstall updates.

So, to get more disk space, you need to clear up the old copies of all installed updates manually if they are no longer needed. Well, how to find out and remove the old Windows updates files? Luckily, Windows built-in tool Disk Cleanup provides you with an option called Windows Update Cleanup, which can help you clean up this kind of files in a simple way.

Windows Update Cleanup feature is designed to help you to release some disk space by removing the old pieces of Windows updates. As long as your computer is working properly after installing the newest updates and you don’t plan on uninstalling any updates, you can launch the Disk Cleanup tool to remove the old files of Windows updates.

However, when utilizing Disk Cleanup’s Windows Update Cleanup feature to clear old pieces of Windows updates, many users find that Disk Cleanup is stuck on Windows Update Cleanup.

If you are one of them who encounter Windows Update Cleanup stuck issue, you can try the following solutions to get rid of the Disk Cleanup stuck on Windows Update Cleanup issue.

Solution 1. Delete Contents of SoftwareDistribution Folder

Usually, the Windows update files are stored in the SoftwareDistribution folder before they are installed on the operating system. If the files in this folder get corrupted, you may encounter the Windows Update Cleanup stuck when running the Disk Cleanup.

In this case, you may delete the contents in the SoftwareDistribution folder manually, which can remove old files of Windows updates. Here are detailed steps.

Step 1. Open File Explorer. Copy and paste the following path to the address bar.

C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution

Step 2. After opening the SoftwareDistribution folder, select all the sub-folders in the folder and choose Delete to delete all.

Solution 2. Delete the Contents of Windows.old Folder Manually

The Windows.old folder stores the old version of Windows after an upgrade, which is helpful when you want to revert to the older version of Windows. However, it can also lead to the Disk Cleanup stuck on Windows Update Cleanup issue. So you may need to delete all the sub-folders in the Windows.old folder.

You may follow the steps below to perform the deletion.

Step 1. Open File Explorer. Then copy and paste the following path to the address bar to open the Windows.old folder.

C:\Windows.old

Step 2. Delete all the files inside the Windows.old folder.

You can also run commands to remove files in the Windows.old folder manually. Type cmd in the Windows search box and right click the best match Command Prompt to choose Run as administrator. Then type the following commands one by one and hit Enter after each.

• takeown /F C:\Windows.old\* /R /A
• cacls C:\Windows.old\*.* /T /grant administrators:F
• rmdir /S /Q C:\Windows.old\*.*

Solution 3. Run Windows Update Troubleshooter

Windows Update Troubleshooter can scan and fix any problem that is associated with Windows Update. So if you come across purging Windows Update Cleanup stuck, you can also run Windows Update Troubleshooter to resolve the problem.

You can follow the steps below to run Windows Update Troubleshooter.

Step 1. Right click Windows Start menu and choose Settings from the menu.

Step 2. On the Setting window, select Update and Security.

Step 3. Under the Troubleshoot tab, locate the Windows Update and click Run the troubleshooter.

After Windows Update Troubleshooter scans and fixes problems it detected, you can check if the Disk Cleanup stuck on Windows Update Cleanup issue gets fixed.

Solution 4. Run System File Checker

If there are corrupted or missing system files on your computer, you could also get the Windows Update Cleanup stuck error. In this case, you’d better run System File Checker to scan and fix any corrupted system file.

Here are detailed steps to run System File Checker:

Step 1. Type cmd in the Windows search box. Right-click the best match Command Prompt and choose Run as administrator.

Step 2. Type sfc/ scannow in the Command Prompt and hit Enter.

Step 3. Once there are corrupted or missing system files detected by System File Checker, it will fix them automatically. Just wait patiently when it is scanning.

How to fix the issue SFC scannow not working? Here, this article focuses on two cases of SFC error. Try to use the following methods.

Solution 5. Run DISM

System File Checker may not always work. If you still encounter Windows Update Cleanup stuck after running System File Checker, you can run DISM (Deployment Image Servicing and Management) utility to repair Windows system files.

If you don’t know how to run DISM, you can follow the steps below:

Step 1. Type cmd in the Windows search bar, right-click the best match Command Prompt and choose Run as administrator to open it.

Step 2. Then type the following commands one by one and hit Enter after each.

• DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth
• DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth
• DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth

Then DISM will fix the detected corrupted file. After it is finished, check if Windows Update Cleanup stuck error gets fixed.

Solution 6. Run Disk Cleanup in Clean Boot

The Windows Update Cleanup stuck error can be triggered by software conflicts. So it could be caused by the third-party software that you have installed on your computer. But you don’t know which one causes the error. In this case, you’d better perform a clean boot and then run the Disk Cleanup utility. A clean boot will start your system with the minimal amount of services it required, which removes the possibility of third-party software interference.

Step 1. Press Windows Key and R together on the keyboard to bring up the Run dialog box. In the Run box, type msconfig and hit Enter.

Step 2. On the System Configuration window, switch to the Services Tab. Then check the box next to the Hide All Microsoft Services and click Disable All button.

Step 3. Then switch to the Startup tab. Click Open Task Manager.

Step 4. Select each startup item and click Disable. After disabling all, close Task Manager.

Step 5. Then, click Apply and OK in the Startup tab of System Configuration to save the change. Restart your computer in a clean boot environment.

Step 6. After starting your PC in a clean boot environment, you can run Disk Cleanup again to check if the Disk Cleanup stuck on Windows Update Cleanup issue gets resolved.

Solution 7. Run Third-party Space Analyzer

If the above fixes cannot help you resolve the Windows Update Cleanup stuck issue, you can run the Space Analyzer in MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition.

MiniTool Partition Wizard is an all-in-one partition manager. It can help you move/resize partition, extend partition, format partition, convert MBR to GPT without data loss, migrate OS to SSD/HD and so on.

Besides, its Space Analyzer feature can help you analyze disk space to find large files on your hard drive, remove system error memory dump files and delete other useless files on the drive to release disk space.

If you are unable to use Disk Cleanup to delete unnecessary files on the computer including temporary files, old Windows update files and other types of files, you can download MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition to help you find and delete these files.

You can click the following button to download one now.

After downloading and installing the free partition manager, you can launch the program and follow the steps below to run Space Analyzer.

Step 1. On the main interface of MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition, click Space Analyzer.

Step 2. Click the drop-down menu to select a partition to scan. Then click Scan button.

Step 3. After analyzing disk space, you will get the following screenshot. It will show you which file or folder is taking up your disk space most. You can also double click a file extension from the right pane to view the specific type of files only.

Step 4. To delete a file or a folder, you can right-click it and select delete to recycle bin or delete permanently. For example, you need to delete the sub-folders in the SoftwareDistribution folder. Right click the sub-folder and choose a way to delete it.

Apart from analyzing C drive, you can also utilize Space Analyzer to analyze other drives that need to release free space. Click the following button to download the free Space Analyzer now.

Bottom Line

After reading this post, have you fixed Windows Update Cleanup stuck issue? Which method works for you? If you have better solutions, please don’t hesitate to share it with us.

If you have any question about how to use the Space Analyzer in MiniTool Partition Wizard Free Edition, you can leave a message in the following comment zone and we will reply as soon as possible. If you need any help when using MiniTool software, you may contact us via [email protected] .