[Milambar]

I've been using a computer since I left school. I've worked as a sysadmin for a number of companies, cutting my teeth on an old Xenix system.

Thats over 20 years of experience, and I have to admit, that I have never heard of clearing a browser cache to improve performance before. Usually it has a slightly opposite effect, because as you said, it is where it stores frequently accessed files.

There are many many valid reasons for clearing a browser cache, and yes, I too recommend it is cleared as part of a general computer "cleanup" regularly. However, network performance has never been one of the reasons.

I cannot see how a corrupt file would cause slow browsing. If the browser detects a corrupt file, it will just re-download it as part of the normal process. Once detected the corrupt file, it would purge the file (in theory anyway).

I will accept that clearing the cache may improve speeds for some people, although I cannot understand how or why.