First thumbs.db was a WinXP only thing. Windows Vista and higher store the thumbnails on C:\ in the users folder! But actually the thumbs.db file was great! Th

First thumbs.db was a WinXP only thing. Windows Vista and higher store the thumbnails on C:\ in the users folder! But actually the thumbs.db file was great! The thumbnails were local next to the files. With WinNT 6+ the thumbnail store grows several GBs on C: for each user. If one moves a directory it has to reindex it. Attaching a USB removeable drive increases your central thumbnail file on C: even further. There is a pruning feature so if you don't access the USB storage the data is overwritten. Then the Windows Shell has to index Terabytes of external data again. Win7 has a bug that every now and then updating the central thumbnail store (and using Windows Security Essential) consumes more memory (16+ GB) than is available - it was clearly never tested with 100.000s of media files. It doesn't help that Windows Explorer starting with Vista lost several convenient features like remember the file list style of every folder or using a "folder.jpg" file as folder preview picture instead of showing 4 random pictures. Win8.1/10 at least brought back the "up" button. WinXP had also a real toolbar that could be changed, now you need a custom shell extension.