Huge hidden folder...Please help!

Question

I have noticed my C drive will get close to full, then things dissapear after I delete a movie or make some kind of space, but recently all of a sudden my C drive is critically full and have been able to trace 260gb's to
C:\Users\Mxxxxxx\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows
I can right click, properties, and sure enough it shows 260gb being stored somewhere in this folder, but when I search every single folder in there, even what hidden ones show up when clicking "show hidden" not one folder has anything even remotely that big. I have tried every way I can think of to see where this space is being taken up in this location, but nothing, not even any searches I have done has shown me anything I have not tried.
I do know that out of curiosity I checked my "network Sharing" just to make sure I have not for some reason allowed some shared storage or something, when I look at "data Usage" I can see Internet explorer using some god awful amount of data, 2764gb's of it, I do use IE to monitor security cameras, but do not think they are storing data on my PC? but anyway I cannot find what is taking so much space on my drive in that folder or how to delete it or stop whatever is doing it.
I hope this makes sense, these days, getting old I sometimes think what I say does not make a whole lot of sense, but the bottom line is something is eating up disk space, almost like it appears, some goes away, then all of a sudden it is back to almost completely full.
BTW: Example, when my warning came up, "disk almost full" (only had 34mb's left) I deleted a few files/folders that I was not using, nothing huge, just to try and make any kind of room and was able to delete a couple hundred MB's, but the next day it shows I have 21gb's left... just really strange. almost like something is storing files, then deleting them, maybe caching them or something, just know I cannot find this 260gb folder....
Thanks for the help in advance...

Answer 1

No errors, optimized. no changes

Answer 2

Use Treesize Free to analyze the disk space.

https://www.jam-software.com/treesize_free

Also, you should periodically run cleanmgr.exe (aka Disk Cleanup) to clean up temp files, dump files, etc.

Answer 3

So great program, with TreeSize I found this folder
C:\Users\Mxxxxxxx\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache
and a folder called Virtualized whish is 260gb.... Have no idea so far, just found it, any ideas?
Thanks so much for all the help!

Answer 4

Do you browse with IE or Edge? Did you try cleanmgr.exe? What about clearing the cache in the browser.

https://community.microcenter.com/kb/articles/90-how-to-clear-cache-on-microsoft-edge-new-chromium-based-version

Do you have some extension in your browser that might be doing this?

https://forums.techguy.org/threads/solved-virtualized-temporary-internet-files-how-do-i-get-rid-of-them-to-free-up-me.932480/

Answer 5

I use IE for security cameras thats all, have a Unifi controller but that is on a cloud key etc...
I use Firefox for everything else...

I used disk cleanup...