Registry Cleaners

I'm looking for advice on registry cleaning software. There is so much garbage out there that i don't trust any of them.
Any ideas as to which work ones are reliable and compatible with ESET?

thanks,

 

Hi.

This is a recurring subject at Wilders with both negative and positive views on the need for a registry cleaner. Do a forum search for Registry Cleaners and you will find a bunch of good advice.

Welcome BTW.

 

They shouldn't be trusted. If you keep that in mind while using one, it might work out all right for you.

CCleaner is popular, and free, and relatively "safe", such as it is.

Use it judiciously, if you use it at all. Only remove items that you know for dead certain you want removed. Just because CCleaner or any other reg cleaner flags something is not automatically an indication that it's something you should remove or should even desire to remove.

There's a school of thought that says the registry never needs "cleaning", period. And you sure can't muck something up if you never mess with it to begin with.
The number of users who have completely borked their machine by removing every entry a reg cleaner flags are legion.

If you should decide to go ahead and use CCleaner or any other reg cleaner anyway, just keep this stuff in mind.

 

I use RegVac from www.superwin.com at least daily and have never had a problem with it. All updates are free after the initial purchase.

Well worth a look!

Green Giant

 

I've never used a registry cleaner and never had any problems with that, either.

 

I used most if not all of the big-name Registry Cleaners on my last PC, I never did notice much of a difference. If anything it just caused problems.

With this PC, I've been running nothing but Auslogics Diskdefrag and CClearner.

Smooth sailing

 

The best and safest registry cleaner is none.

 

From time to time I use...and recommend
"all-in-one" utilities
Vit Registry Fix Free
Glary utilities
CCleaner
for manual searching by keywords
RegSeeker
for backup and optimising registry
ERUNT GUI

 

+1.

 

Spot on. I didn't see a difference between system with or without registry cleaner installed. Another thing is that by using one you can expected that some day it'll give you extra time to spend at fixing your system due to removal important registry keys.
So if you have to - use registry cleaners very carefully.

 

While it may be practically safer to leave the registry alone, I'm not sure it is correct to argue that a registry "bloated" with irrelevant entries is as efficient as a lean, mean registry. It maybe just that improvements in computing power mask any reductions in efficiency due to registry bloat.

That there's a fair chance of ruining one's PC while attempting to clean the registry may be a fact but it's also something that should be fixed in the next version of Windows.

 

The only reg cleaner i trust is CCleaner. Never killed my system.

 

Yes, but has anyone ever measured the efficiency of a "bloated" Vs Lean registry? It's not uncommon to demonstrate differences in performance with synthetic benchmarks that cannot be perceived by the user. I have to ask what value there is in performing a risky operation on the registry that at best produces no perceivable benefit and at worst destroys the OS? I have customers who use registry cleaners and their systems have peculiar and often uncorrectable behaviors which I think can be attributed to their use. I point this out to them, but they ignore my advice because they perceive some imaginary benefit in using the cleaners. It would be safer if they stopped using registry cleaners and moved on to ram defraggers to get the same fix LOL

 

it did once for me.
good thing i had an image to restore to.

like others here have said, check carefully the items one by one to make sure they're safe before deleting.

my advice is not to fool with them.

 

Only used registry cleaners CCleaner and Eusing Free Registry once and that was when SAS damaged Avira and my Win 7 instalation with a FP. I keep then updated with a "Break Glass and only use in case of fire" mentality.

 

Definitely created problems on mine. None of them are trustworthy.

@vasa1: What will be fixed in the next generation of Windows is even less need for any of these useless cleaners.
That's what happened with the release of Vista and 7 (ex: registry virtualization).

 

That's good to know. Meanwhile "leaked" images relating to Win 8 are being referred to on various blogs.

 

CCleaner is well tested and trusted here

 

If you're talking about the file cleaner portion, I would agree.

 

The safest registry cleaner is CCleaner, most of the others free and paid delete too many valid entries needed by Windows which causes more harm than good.

Registry cleaners only can solve some software/ installer related problems, they can't fix severe system errors like many say they can. It is not proven that they can make your system run better either.

If Windows is running well than don't try to fix what is not broken.

Thanks.

 

I use CCleaner's. I've never had a problem with it, and I haven't heard of anyone that has either.

 

I use ace utilities and never had a problem.I use a cleaner (and registry workshop) because some programs that Ive installed don't uninstall properly.Sometimes a start up entry can be left resulting in windows giving an error message that it cant find the missing app.A decent registry cleaner fixes problems like that.How many wont use a registry cleaner and yet uses an app like total uninstall or your uninstaller?.These programs also trawl the registry for any leftovers of the program your uninstalling and hopefully only show you the right results.As with all tools they are just another layer,and full imaging is recommended in all cases as a first safety defense,when using such tools.
ellison

 

You can manually remove remnants of a program without using registry cleaners. Just search your drive and your registry for the program name.

I don't use third-party uninstallers either.

 

Well yeah...you can manually remove anything without using any program if your that way inclined ,and knowledgeable enough.However if you make a mistake then your as likely to mess up your system as using a propriety registry cleaner so i don't quite see the point?Any software is capable of hosing a system if its badly coded.Well known and established Registry cleaners don't have the monoply on that imo.
ellison

 

After running a Registry De-fragmentation Tool, I only noticed just a few seconds (2"-3") Faster Boot-Time.
As far as Registry Cleaning, it has been severely reduced after Vista...