With the slightest effort, do you want to perform a disk cleanup operation? In this blogpost, we are setting up the Storage Sense to cleanup Temporary Files & Empty recycle bin on Windows 365 Cloud PC & AVD Multi-session host. Note by no means is Storage Sense a replacement for the detailed cleanmgr.exe tool, which can perform disk cleanup options in a much more granular manner. The below method is a quick method to get you started and later on improvise on your disk cleanup strategy.
What is Storage Sense?
Storage Sense is a feature in Microsoft Windows 11 that helps users free up space on their device by automatically deleting unnecessary files. It can delete temporary files, files in the recycle bin, and files that have not been accessed in a certain period of time. It also helps users to see what is taking up space on their device and gives them the option to delete specific files or move files to an external storage device.
What features are available within Storage Sense?
Storage Sense in Microsoft Windows 11 has the following features:
- Automatic cleanup: Storage Sense can automatically delete temporary files, files in the recycle bin, and files that have not been accessed in a certain period of time.
- Storage usage: It helps users to see what is taking up space on their device, and gives them the option to delete specific files or move files to an external storage device.
- Storage sense can move files to external storage device
- Storage sense can compress files to save space
- Storage sense can move files to the cloud
- Storage sense can delete files that are no longer needed
- Storage sense can free up space by uninstalling apps
- Storage sense can show you the storage usage of each app
- Storage sense can help you to free up storage by cleaning up your downloads folder
What Configurations are available within Intune (MEM Portal)?
There are many ways to setup Storage Sense. However, the method we are going to opt is inline with the modern workplace management solution using Microsoft Intune (Microsoft Endpoint Manager admin center)
| Setting Name | Details |
| Allow Disk Health Model Updates | Allows disk health model updates to predict disk hardware failure. |
| Allow Storage Sense Global | Storage Sense can automatically clean some of the user’s files to free up disk space. By default, Storage Sense is automatically turned on when the machine runs into low disk space and is set to run whenever the machine runs into storage pressure. This cadence can be changed in Storage settings or set with the |
| Allow Storage Sense Temporary Files Cleanup | When Storage Sense runs, it can delete the user’s temporary files that are not in use. If the Storage/AllowStorageSenseGlobal policy is disabled, then this policy does not have any effect. If you enable this policy setting, Storage Sense will delete the user’s temporary files that are not in use. |
| Config Storage Sense Cloud Content Dehydration Threshold | When Storage Sense runs, it can dehydrate cloud-backed content that hasn’t been opened in a certain amount of days. If the Storage/AllowStorageSenseGlobal policy is disabled, then this policy does not have any effect. If you enable this policy setting, you must provide the minimum number of days a cloud-backed file can remain unopened before Storage Sense dehydrates it. Supported values are: 0–365. If you set this value to zero, Storage Sense will not dehydrate any cloud-backed content. The default value is 0, which never dehydrates cloud-backed content |
| Config Storage Sense Downloads Cleanup Threshold | When Storage Sense runs, it can delete files in the user’s Downloads folder if they haven’t been opened for more than a certain number of days. If the Storage/AllowStorageSenseGlobal policy is disabled, then this policy does not have any effect. If you enable this policy setting, you must provide the minimum number of days a file can remain unopened before Storage Sense deletes it from the Downloads folder. Supported values are: 0-365. If you set this value to zero, Storage Sense will not delete files in the user’s Downloads folder |
| Config Storage Sense Recycle Bin Cleanup Threshold | When Storage Sense runs, it can delete files in the user’s Recycle Bin if they have been there for over a certain amount of days. If the Storage/AllowStorageSenseGlobal policy is disabled, then this policy does not have any effect. If you enable this policy setting, you must provide the minimum age threshold (in days) of a file in the Recycle Bin before Storage Sense will delete it. Supported values are: 0–365 |
| Removable Disk Deny Write Access | If you enable this policy setting, write access is denied to this removable storage class. If you disable or do not configure this policy setting, write access is allowed to this removable storage class. Note: To require that users write data to BitLocker-protected storage, enable the policy setting “Deny write access to drives not protected by BitLocker,” which is located in “Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\BitLocker Drive Encryption\Removable Data Drives.” |
What policies are we applying?
In this scenario, we only focus on the deletion of temporary files, Recycle Bin, Moving the files to the OneDrive Known Folder (if configured) and checking the disk hardware.
What is the target of this policy?
We aim to kill two birds with one stone, and this policy configuration is not only applicable for Windows 10/11 based Windows 365 Cloud PC, it also works well for Windows 10/11 Multi-session host for Azure Virtual Desktop. This filter is critical to identifying whether the configuration setting will apply to your device type.
Assignments
We are assiging the policy to the Windows 365 AAD device group and add the Azure Virtual Desktop AAD device group here.
Worth a mention, Jannik Reinhard has published a remediation method via cleanmgr.exe and PowerShell – Use Endpoint Analytics to clean up the disk – Modern Device Management (jannikreinhard.com) and is also a great resource if you decide to go into phase 2 strategy of disk clean-up.
I hope you will find this helpful information for performing disk clean-up on Temporary & Recycle for Windows 365 Cloud PC & AVD. Please let me know if I have missed any steps or details, and I will be happy to update the post.
Thanks,
Aresh Sarkari
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