Registry cleaners: Do they really work?

Has anyone out there used registry cleaners? Do they really work?

 

There are many registry cleaners out there and you will get a hundred recomendations as to which is best, but yes some of them do work well. I believe one of the best is RegCleaner you can get a free copy here

 

Recently there was a long thread at DSLR-software-forum about TuneUp Utilities 2004.

Many regular and well-known posters there gave it big thumbs-up :

Thread at DSLR:
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,10657478~mode=flat

Site:
http://www.tune-up.com/

Note-1: it is not free but has a trial-version.
Note-2: I haven't tried it; maybe I will do that.

 

I am presently using the commercial software, RegSupreme Pro - http://www.macecraft.com/ - and have had no problems so far in removing entries that it has flagged.

In general it does an excellent job removing debris that another program's uninstaller has left behind. Therefore it seems to do the job it was intended for. Further, it seems to remove more entries SAFELY than other registry cleaners that I have used.

In addition a general sweep of the registry about every month or so ( depending upon how many programs you install/uninstall) stops the the registry from becoming bloated.

However, as with all registry cleaners you are recommended to take a backup/disc image before changing the registry.

Just trying out Tuneup Utilities 2004. Looks like an improved version of Norton Utilities and it did find some registry entries for deletion. Overall it looks a very nice program as it includes in addition to a registry cleaner, a registry defragmenter and some other opitimiser tweaks. Maybe a keeper!

 

Just took TuneUp Utilities 2004 for a test drive and its very nice. Alot of things you can do with it. According to my already installed registry apps, it does just as good as they couldn't find anything to fix after runnning it.

 

Short answer: Yes.

Use a recognised good one.... 3 mentioned in these posts. I, like Blackcat, am using RegSupreme PRO.

First time I used it, I had almost 1200 entries, [using Deep Scan] took the plunge and cleaned the lot.

Never had any trouble yet. I clean about once a week and usually end up with around anywhere between 100-200 entries, as I move a lot of stuff around [mainly images as involved with GFX] and everytime you do even something like that, it leaves an entry.

TAS

 

A few good replies have been posted above and in this thread, but for the most part we've been listing our favorite registry cleaners. I believe the more interesting issue is Close_Hauled's second question...

...which I take to mean "Does proper usage provide any benefit?". Here's the thing, Wilder's members are likely to be more fastidious with PC health and efficiency that the typical user. A lot of us don't care if a cleaner registry only provides a miniscule boost in performance (or none at all) - it just drives us a little crazy to know the junk is there. I believe there would have to be an awful lot of junk entries removed to make a significant impact (Please note that I didn't quantify "awful lot"
).

 

I like the Macecraft products too (I gritted my teeth and paid for JV-16, since I'd been using the freeware version for ages and loved it.)

Two big pluses (actually 3, come to think of it) about RegSupreme and JV-16. Firstly, it tags all registry entries as probably-must-keep, unnecessary, and the in-between "not sure" ones, and gives you the option of not even displaying the must-keep ones. And it's fairly cautious and conservative in these categories, to the point where I confidently delete the green "unnecessary" ones without even bothering to save the backups for them.

More importantly, in terms of differences from competing products, it gives a brief description of what it doesn't like in entries it suggests to remove -- "file doesn't exist", for instance. Most other products I've tried simply give you a raw listing of such entries, and you have to rely on experience-plus-luck to decide which ones to clean out, meaning backups are a critical must if you guess wrong.

 

Same here. But I'm still using the free version. A very good tool.

 

This is what Mike is referring to.

TAS

 

Sure they work. Why shouldn't they. All they do is they delete enties that are recognized as "Invalid" by algorithm during programs registry scan.

Same as if you would delete them with Windows's Regedit program. It only spears some time (well, or not only some), and making all this job much, much easier and "painless".

For example, like keys related to uninstalled programs, values pointing to non-existant files and directories.


Note, the only few differences between them are:

- number of additional features they offer
- which company made them (is it well-known)
- this above related to soft reliability
- uh and yeah, of course, also are they FREEWARE or SHAREWARE


Though I actually DON'T trust some of them. But there are few good ones out there, including RegCleanr which is FREEWARE, and Registry First Aid (Reg1Aid), which is SHAREWARE.



And yeah, please, see this thread on WinForums:

http://forums.winforums.org



That particular "Registry cleaners" related thread:

Winforums.org > OS & Software Support > Windows Software & Utilities

http://forums.winforums.org/showthread.php?t=6192]Registry cleaner
http://forums.winforums.org/showthread.php?t=6192&page=1]Registry cleaner - page 1
http://forums.winforums.org/showthread.php?t=6192&page=2]Registry cleaner - page 2



HTH

 

is there a difference between the registry cleaner of bigc's regcleaner and jv16?(the last freeware one,i think its 1.3)and should you run something like NTREGOPT afterwards? edit heres a link
http://www.321download.com/LastFreeware/

 

Thank you all for your insightful responses. I will take a look at the utilities that you have recommended. I will Ghost my drives before trying them out.

My registry cleaner question was prompted by a resent system crash that I am still investigating. When I asked the question, I still did not understand what happened to my system. Even now, I do not know, but I know a lot more.

I try to keep my system (Intel D850GB) as neat and tidey as possible for I only use it for gaming. But even with all my effort, my system took a header a couple of weeks ago. I was able to restore it, and noticed that the Intel Active Monitor was not able to start due to some SMBus problems. I uninstalled Active Monitor and the errors in the Event Viewer went away (I am not at home, so I do not have the details). I am concerned that I might have a hardware problem, but I am hoping that it is a software problem.

I quess what I really need to know is what Intel Active Monitor needs in order to function properly. I need it because it manages the fans and it alerts me of any overheating, over/under voltages, and fan failures.

Close Hauled

 

If you need to reinstall activity monitor you can direct download it here


or you might try this Intel desktop control center

 

Thanks, I will give those a try.

I already reinstalled the Active Monitor and I get the following error;

--------------------[BEGIN]--------------------
Event Type: Error
Event Source: Service Control Manager
Event Category: None
Event ID: 7003
Date: 7/5/2004
Time: 9:44:39 AM
User: N/A
Computer: ACOMPUTER
Description:
The Intel(R) Active Monitor service depends on the following nonexistent service: SMBusP

For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.
--------------------[END]--------------------

I believe that the SMBusP service is installed when Active Monitor is installed.

Close Hauled

 

The desktop control center looks better to me than the activity monitor you can manually set fan speeds and other things.

 

Thanks for the input. I just looked at it and it does not support the D850GB board.

Close Hauled

 

I don't know how, but it's now working. I reinstalled again and there are no errors. But I am not yet writing this one off, because I have no idea why the system crashed to begin with.

Close Hauled

 

just give it a hug and hope for the best.

 

As a user of RegSeeker, I can attest to the power and usefulness of a registry cleaner... RegSeeker allowed me to remove the parts of RealPlayer that remained after uninstallation, for example. (RealPlayer really does get everywhere... It took me a fair amount of time to get rid of all the crap it left.)

 

I hear you my brother. MusicMatch leaves behind MMTASK and no way to turn it off. Every update, it re-installs it.

Close Hauled