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apple apologists/experts - iTunes question for you

narlus

Eastcoast Softcore
Staff member
Nov 7, 2001
24,658
65
behind the viewfinder
what the hell are the large tmp files for in iTunes?

they are taking over my system hard drive...my machine was choking down pretty hard, and i found that the iTunes library was over 50GB.

50 gig! what's up w/ that? and the majority are these i T##.tmp (where ## = a serial number) files...356 of them, and they are each over 120MB or so...can i kill these w/ impunity? what the hell are they? i may have no choice, because i can't fill my OS drive w/ these things.

btw, my C drive is just programs; i've got 4 more drives for data.

i did a google search and the only thing which came up was some blog guy saying that he deleted them and it took the music off his iPod. i don't have mine synced, so i doubt that will be the case, but i want to know if it's OK to nuke these things before i pull the trigger.
 

Reactor

Turbo Monkey
Apr 5, 2005
3,976
1
Chandler, AZ, USA
hmm.... can't help you. I can't find any apple related temp files on my wintel laptop. Found a quite a few windows DLA temp files and a bunch of windows update temp files.
 

narlus

Eastcoast Softcore
Staff member
Nov 7, 2001
24,658
65
behind the viewfinder
well this bloated program continues to spawn these things faster than e coli...once i get all the music loaded onto my iPod, i doubt i'll be opening iTunes again in a long time.
 

narlus

Eastcoast Softcore
Staff member
Nov 7, 2001
24,658
65
behind the viewfinder
convenient scapegoat, for sure.

if iPod sales were restricted to Mac owners, there wouldn't be too many, would there?

nice for apple to pork their market. :oink:

seriously, this is a disgrace.
 

Reactor

Turbo Monkey
Apr 5, 2005
3,976
1
Chandler, AZ, USA
I would guess it has something to do with Narlus's quantity of music.


Probably. It may be some sort of temp file Itunes is making while converting audio file formats. I have six gigs of audio mostly mp3, with some WMA and apple native stuff, and a few gigs of video. I've never experienced anything like this. I wonder if there is a registry setting to re-point where it's making the temp files?
 

corey_rideDC

Turbo Monkey
Sep 1, 2004
1,368
0
DCmetro
i liked the itunes interface and many of the features, but stopped using it due to bloat and its large footprint. been rockin the QCD lately.
 

Reactor

Turbo Monkey
Apr 5, 2005
3,976
1
Chandler, AZ, USA
After researching apple's discussion forums it appears it's most likely a problem that occurs with some flavors of PC anti-virus software combined with large size libraries. The temp files are normally deleted but the AV software intereferes with the process and the file isn't deleted. It seems plausible and I've seen similar things happen on servers with AV software and other products.

In short, you need the Microsoft appologists, not the Apple ones. You may be able to change your AV settings to work around it.
 

narlus

Eastcoast Softcore
Staff member
Nov 7, 2001
24,658
65
behind the viewfinder
if it is AV-related, the issue cropped up both w/ Panda and AVG, according to the creation dates of the tmp files.

i guess i'll just delete them and move on. thanks for the research.
 

syadasti

i heart mac
Apr 15, 2002
12,690
290
VT
if it is AV-related, the issue cropped up both w/ Panda and AVG, according to the creation dates of the tmp files.

i guess i'll just delete them and move on. thanks for the research.
Did you Rio Music Manager program ever have that problem with your huge library? I bet fubar2000 doesn't.

Guess you need to look to third party software, maybe you can check ilounge to see what others with huge libraries use to sync...
 

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,162
1,261
NC
If it's AV related, just put your music libraries in your anti virus program's "exception" section.
 

narlus

Eastcoast Softcore
Staff member
Nov 7, 2001
24,658
65
behind the viewfinder
i don't sync my iPod to my PC...i choose the songs and that's it.

it took me a while to do it, but i've hand-chosen enough songs so there's only about 200MB left on the machine. :D

btw, BV, avg is phasing out their free AV program at the end of this year. any other good suggestions for free ones?
 

syadasti

i heart mac
Apr 15, 2002
12,690
290
VT
any other good suggestions for free ones?
I use the free Avira AntiVir PE 7 w/the settings tweaked, multiple daily updates scheduled, and the update ad pop-up process blacklisted in the windows security policy. It has one of the highest ranked AV engines on the market (free or not) and is very light on resources.

Avast! free edition is also ranked above avg, more user friendly and feature filled. It uses more resources than AntiVir, but you can choose which modules you want to run since you probably don't need them all.
 

binary visions

The voice of reason
Jun 13, 2002
22,162
1,261
NC
Avast! is what I've been putting on the office computers since it's a little prettier than AVG and the user interface is a little more straightforward. Given the level of computer idiocy in here and the fact that they haven't been able to break it yet... I'd say that's a decent testimonial :p

Virus Bulletin rates Avast highly as well. It's got a full suite of scanners (email, web, system, etc.). The only thing they ask is that you log back onto the site once a year and renew your license.