clean up the registry

[Kate G.]

Can anyone recommend a good freeware -- shareware (i.e., low cost or no
cost) utility that will clean up the registry?

I'm using Windows XP and things seem a little sluggish lately. I've done
some clean up by uninstalling old aps no longer used, running defrag and
disk cleanup -- but I think that cleaning up the registry may be needed.

I have NO knowledge about editing the registry -- so would prefer NOT to go
in there manually.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Will Denny]

Hi

Registry cleaners aren't really needed with XP - it looks after itself. A 3rd party registry cleaner has to be configured correctly and if you have no knowledge of the registry you could still do your system more harm than good.

 

[Kenny]

Only one I'd trust with XP is the one included with System Mechanic, been
using it for some time now with no problems.
www.iolo.com
Have heard good reports about JV16 Power Tools but never used it myself.
http://www.jv16.org/

 

[Maureen Goldman]

Can anyone recommend a good freeware -- shareware (i.e., low cost or no
cost) utility that will clean up the registry?

I'm using Windows XP and things seem a little sluggish lately. I've done
some clean up by uninstalling old aps no longer used, running defrag and
disk cleanup -- but I think that cleaning up the registry may be needed.

I have NO knowledge about editing the registry -- so would prefer NOT to go
in there manually.

I like Regseeker (freeware). It creates backups of anything that it
removes, but as with any of these programs, do back up the registry
beforehand.
http://www.hoverdesk.net/freeware.htm

 

[Edward W. Thompson]

"Cleaning" the registry will not improve performance (sluggish). I suggest
you defrag (appears you may have already done this) and check for
applications that may be running in the background and close those you don't
require.

 

[Kate G.]

I do have a LARGE number of apps running --- how do I know which are
critical and which I can shut down?

Thanks!

KG

PS --- I can snag an image of the running aps window and email it if that
would be helpful.

 

[Edward W. Thompson]

None of them will be "critical". Critical in the sense as being required by
the OS to function

The easiest approach is to go to "Start" then and enter "msconfig" (no
inverted commas) at "Run". You can now
choose various start-up modes which are intuitive. From that you can tell
what apps you require and which can be deleted from the start-up program
without ill effect.

Generally speaking the only "apps" you need to be running in the background
(as shown on the task bar) are Antivirus and a Firewall, everything else
will be optional.