Question Firefox consuming ssd space randomly after updating Windows 10 in the last few days.

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Aug 14, 2019
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Over the last few days I've noticed that my SSD was filling up without me downloading anything, I've run virus scans, checked the health of the SSD to find no issues, then today I closed Firefox and checked File Explorer to see the space had returned. Have no idea why Firefox is now consuming space and nothing I've tried has worked, any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
Aug 14, 2019
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Well that was a complete waste of time and only created more annoyance. Backed up, uninstalled firefox, reinstalled, now I have to log back into everything, and STILL am losing ssd space as time passes. It didn't fix anything.
 

mgaissert

Prominent
Oct 16, 2017
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Confused Cat: I have not seen any suggestions about deleting your extra files on the computer. I would install CCleaner to clean up the files that are always saved and not deleted (on mine computer, too.) Firefox stores and does not delete a huge quantity. Sometimes as much as a gig during a week.

Then I would clean up the huge quantity of files that MS leaves on the computer each time it up dates. The average that I clean after each monthly update are around 3 gigs. Microsoft may change this in the future, but for now I do this monthly:
Right click on the C:/ drive. Scroll to Properties on the menu that pops up and left click. Just to the right of the large circle will be Disk Cleanup. Left click on that and when that exercise finishes you will get a new Menu "Disk Cleanup for OS at bottom left is Clean up System Files. Left click. That will run for a while, depending how many files have been saved. (The most I have ever seen was 50 Gigs on a Windows 7.) I would look to the left at the list that comes up. I never delete the Downloaded files. I use that folder as storage.

Then I would move all the folders (Desktop, Documents, etc) to the HD, depending on its size of course. SSD drives work best when have at least 25% of the volume free space.

Good luck, hope this helps a little.

MGaissert
 

Colif

Win 11 Master
Moderator
its almost impossible to search google and get any useful result as it thinks i want to know about ssd writes or RAM usage. Duckduckgo wasn't much better. I am sure it was easier to find things before google search but I digress...

Very few people get this problem. main reason we haven't got an answer yet.

Now its likely the folder that is growing is in your user folder
Type about: profiles into search bar, (there is no space between : and p but stupid forums replaces it with an emoji if i don't add the space, so remove it when you type it)

if you anything like mine, its either
Root directory - C:\Users\Colif\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\ta2ou1yb.default
Local directory - C:\Users\Colif\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\ta2ou1yb.default

The number at end will be different

from the about screen you can open the folder directly

Storage folder is in the roaming folder choice, this is where you need to look. I could guess its the temporary folder since it empties on exit. You might need to run windirstat as admin for it to show folder.

this might help - https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/mozilla_cache_viewer.html

how many tabs do you normally have open? how many arre youtube? 10gb is an awful lot of data...
 
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Aug 14, 2019
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A decent amount of tabs, a small handful of youtube, it varies from day to day. I see a storage folder in the root directory but have no idea if that is the one suppose to be looking for here or if what I should be looking for is actually the roaming folder that shows up in AppData when using windirstat.
 
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Colif

Win 11 Master
Moderator
The screenshot shows the folder location I think you would need to look at. Look in the temporary folder as that is the one emptied on exit.

I don't know what info it shows in there though, might just be a string of characters

kr5xUuI.jpg


Yes, my page file is biggest part of my drive too but I am only using 57gb

I noticed the usage goes up on Firefox over time but mine was in the MB, not gb

Perhaps try closing tabs you aren't currently looking aty and see if it reduces the usage. I know you don't think its the problem but with more free space on drive, this usage wouldn't be as noticeable since its returned when you close the browser.

shame firefox runs as 1 task in process explorer instead of multiple like Chrome, its more difficult to figure out what is using the space.
 
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Aug 14, 2019
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Testing the closing tabs and checking ssd space remaining, no non-video tabs gave anything back. Its youtube and another site where I was watching a video. When I clicked out of the youtube tabs, each one was giving me back some space.
 
Aug 14, 2019
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And left computer on while out and about today, came back to about 5gb left on ssd that didn't clear any space when all things were closed, it returned to 15.6gb upon resetting computer. So confused.
 

Colif

Win 11 Master
Moderator
when you play a video the video saved to a temp folder on your computer (that is why you can go back and forward on a YouTube video fully loaded without having to download/reload it again, and it will stay that way until you refresh that page, closed it or open a new link at the same tab. I don't think you can do any thing about it.

https://forums.tomshardware.com/thr...tube-is-just-using-8-of-my-bandwidth.2284494/

Its probably normal, only reason you notice it is because you only have 15gb of space on ssd. I don't normally use Firefox, would think chrome does same thing though? Perhaps they treat the retention of videos differently
 
Aug 14, 2019
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Not exactly normal, it never did it before I did that update over a week ago, I was always having the same space, then suddenly would get notifications of low space after the update. I even went ahead and purchased a new 500gb ssd and cloned the old ssd to the new one and it still eats the space, but at least now I have 350 gb for it to 'eat' instead.
 

Colif

Win 11 Master
Moderator
well, it gives it all back after.

what update was it? was it a version update (take about 30 minutes to install) or just a regular Tuesday night update?
if 2nd type, can you go to settings/update & security/windows update
under update history, click on the link for the update and post it here... might give me another angle of approach.
 
Aug 14, 2019
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It certainly took quite a while to install, I remember that. Was not quick like usual updates are.
Edit: Just 2 things in update history from the last two days for Security Intelligence Update for Windows Defender Antivirus.
 
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