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[Ron61]

Mike,

I didn't say that they have to be removed, but I can tell no difference in the speed or operation with them in. And I have traced some problems I have had to a file in the prefetch folder. Leave them in as most people do. I just have this carry over from the days of the old, small drives where every byte counts and to me they are an unnecessary bunch of files which can eventually number over 100 that the disk heads have to move over. And as I said anything that the computer does, it will put them right back in. But you may have many from stuff that is gone or you will never use again just taking up space. But with today's huge hard drives, space isn't a problem unless you get so much crap on them that the heads have to hunt all over to find stuff. You are correct that if you leave them in and defrag the disk they won't normally cause any problem, but as I stated earlier in this post I have traced a couple of problems back to a prefetch file and deleted just that file and the computer put in a new one and everything was ok then. I have tried timing my computers with them in and with them removed and with a digital stop watch that reads into the hundredths of a second, I have never noticed enough change to make any difference to me. But, I don't use my computers any more for a lot of stuff that I used to. Another thing that I do which I am sure most people will disagree with is every month or so I clean out System Restore and set a restore point for that day. And if you ever get a virus, some of it can be stored in these restore points. Just ask Ernie.

Ron