What is this files purpose? perflib_perfdata_6c0.dat

What program creates them? WINDOWS (apparently stands for "Will Install Needless Data On Whole System"). I mean think about it, System Monitor/Performance Monitor on a home edition of Windows XP? Come on Uncle Bill, you gotta be kidding, right?

Not sure about Windows XP but you can access the System Monitor interface by issuing "perfmon" in Windows 2000.

...this is my third attempt to post a comment.

While I appreciate the comments very much, I was hoping someone could tell me specifically what service/program creates these files in the specific location namely C:\windows\temp after I power down and reboot or so it seems now, and how I can stop the creation of these files. I opened one of the files in word and all that was there was a lot empty small squares. Row and rows of squares???

st_steve: You could get a simplified System Monitor on Win9x, so why not on XP Home Edition?

I ran perfmon from the Run command and searched it and find no reference to these files as nothing has been setup in the console. It isn't in startup and to my knowledge it had never been opened until your post st__steve, I have disabled all startup items from msconfig and the files were still created on startup the files only dated back to 8-7-02 so I must have installed a windows component or update that started this some time around that date. I still don't know why these files are created or what service/program creates them. It seems there is not much interest in helping figure this out so I will go ahead and award you both the points if I don't get the answer by later today. Thanks for your interest.

Bobby

I removed Management and Monitoring Tools from windows components through the Control Panel and the files were deleted on reboot and none were created. Thanks for the interest.

I'll create another question to award points to st__steve and accept sburck comment as an answer.

This is not a valid logon script:

del /q %SystemRoot%\System32\Perflib_Perfdata*.dat

I've tried it and it doesn't work.

I hate these perflib files - I'm sure they keep changing my homepage and starting pop up everytime I connect to the internet.

Here are my observations regarding the perflib_perfdata files.  I never saw these files on my computer until  I installed a new DVD-CD RW drive and the Nero burning software that came along with it.  They (the files) appeared thereafter and I too went through all of the gyrations listed in the thread regarding the attempts at deletion.

BTW, the files are usually located in the documents and setttings\username (you)\local settings\temp folder.  That is probably why the login script, del /q %SystemRoot%\System32\Perflib_Perfdata*.dat, doesn't work.  The path is wrong.  Anyhow, they will always be recreated by the program that they are associated with.  I knew that the file creation had to be somehow related to the Nero software so I began to look there.  Along with the burning software came a program called InCD which supposedly lets one copy and write files to a CD-R or CD-RW disk as if it were a regular drive on your system.  I suspected this first and removed the program.  Voila! After the removal of InCD there were no more Perf files being created on my drive and I could delete the existing one

So, many of the causes that relate to the creation of these files may not be of malicious origin.  Some legitimate program may be doing it and you will have to find out whcih one it is and whether you really need it or not.

Pueo

Hello there ...

Try to download this tool from XP's resource kit and disable all the counters for performance :-) I usually do this as a default guideline on all systems that I don't need performance counters.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/techinfo/reskit/tools/existing/exctrlst-o.asp

It works for Windows 2000, XP and I think 2003 as well.

Take care,
Marco Bicca

My Perflib_Perfdata file is generated by motherboard monitor 5. I don't even have to delete it. When I shutdown the mbm5 the file disappears on it's own instantly (from local settings/temp. I found it by opening up task manager and deleting processes under my user name.

Hello

I have the same création. And I 've noted that  all the files were examined in the same seconde (I use the option: "Visualise details"  and "list last acces" in the window of folder) when a process is operating. But I don't know which.

Do you know this?

Thank you

FYI, the perflib_perfdata files are also created by PGPServ if you have it installed.

If you enable file shreding in PGP, you'll also see a load of .tmp files with short names and small sizes.  


If you really want to be sure.  Install handle.exe and then run:

handle.exe perflib_perfdata

You'll see the command that's holding it open.

In the batch file above, just change system32 to temp.
del /q %SystemRoot%\temp\Perflib_Perfdata*.dat