F
Francis
Hello All,
Could anyone recommend a good registry cleaner for Windows XP Pro?
Preferably free.
Thanks,
Francis
Could anyone recommend a good registry cleaner for Windows XP Pro?
Preferably free.
Thanks,
Francis
S
Steven K
U can use old Regclean(4.1a) we had for Win98 - it will work in XP as well!Francis said:
F
Familie Oor
Francis schreef:
Reg cleaner or start using linux it has'nt a registry
Reg cleaner or start using linux it has'nt a registry
J
Jordan
Francis said:
EasyCleaner (free)
http://personal.inet.fi/business/toniarts/ecleane.htm
Download:
http://personal.inet.fi/business/toniarts/files/EClea2_0.exe
J
Jim Byrd
Hi Francis - In my experience all of these Reg cleaners, even the best, are
fraught with danger. I advise against using them except in one specific
instance, that is when you have one that is capable of doing specific Reg
searches, and you NEED (not just WANT) to remove the remaining traces of
something that didn't get uninstalled correctly. (and you didn't have
foresight enough to install it using Total Uninstall,
http://www.geocities.com/ggmartau/tu.html or direct dwnld here:
http://files.webattack.com/localdl834/tun234.zip, in the first place.)
Lastly, if you must screw around with your Registry, then at least get
Erunt/Erdnt, and run it before you do the Reg clean. You'll then have a
true restore available to you. Read below to see why you might not just
using the Reg cleaner's restore:
Get Erunt here for all NT-based computers including XP:
http://home.t-online.de/home/lars.hederer/erunt/index.htm I've set it up to
take a scheduled backup each night at 12:01AM on a weekly round-robin basis,
and a Monthly on the 1st of each month. See here for how to set that up:
http://home.t-online.de/home/lars.hederer/erunt/erunt.txt, and for some
useful information about this subject.
This program is one of the best things around - saved my butt on many
occasions, and will also run very nicely from a DOS prompt (in case you've
done something that won't let you boot any more and need to revert to a
previous Registry) IF you're FAT32 OR have a DOS startup disk with NTFS
write drivers in an NTFS system. (There is also a way using the Recovery
Console to get back to being "bootable" even without separate DOS write NTFS
drivers, after which you can do a "normal" Erdnt restore.) (BTW, it also
includes a Registry defragger program). Free, and very, very highly
recommended.
FYI, quoting from the above document:
"Note: The "Export registry" function in Regedit is USELESS (!) to make a
complete backup of the registry. Neither does it export the whole registry
(for example, no information from the "SECURITY" hive is saved), nor can the
exported file be used later to replace the current registry with the old
one. Instead, if you re-import the file, it is merged with the current
registry, leaving you with an absolute mess of old and new registry keys.
--
Please respond in the same thread.
Regards, Jim Byrd, MS-MVP
In
fraught with danger. I advise against using them except in one specific
instance, that is when you have one that is capable of doing specific Reg
searches, and you NEED (not just WANT) to remove the remaining traces of
something that didn't get uninstalled correctly. (and you didn't have
foresight enough to install it using Total Uninstall,
http://www.geocities.com/ggmartau/tu.html or direct dwnld here:
http://files.webattack.com/localdl834/tun234.zip, in the first place.)
Lastly, if you must screw around with your Registry, then at least get
Erunt/Erdnt, and run it before you do the Reg clean. You'll then have a
true restore available to you. Read below to see why you might not just
using the Reg cleaner's restore:
Get Erunt here for all NT-based computers including XP:
http://home.t-online.de/home/lars.hederer/erunt/index.htm I've set it up to
take a scheduled backup each night at 12:01AM on a weekly round-robin basis,
and a Monthly on the 1st of each month. See here for how to set that up:
http://home.t-online.de/home/lars.hederer/erunt/erunt.txt, and for some
useful information about this subject.
This program is one of the best things around - saved my butt on many
occasions, and will also run very nicely from a DOS prompt (in case you've
done something that won't let you boot any more and need to revert to a
previous Registry) IF you're FAT32 OR have a DOS startup disk with NTFS
write drivers in an NTFS system. (There is also a way using the Recovery
Console to get back to being "bootable" even without separate DOS write NTFS
drivers, after which you can do a "normal" Erdnt restore.) (BTW, it also
includes a Registry defragger program). Free, and very, very highly
recommended.
FYI, quoting from the above document:
"Note: The "Export registry" function in Regedit is USELESS (!) to make a
complete backup of the registry. Neither does it export the whole registry
(for example, no information from the "SECURITY" hive is saved), nor can the
exported file be used later to replace the current registry with the old
one. Instead, if you re-import the file, it is merged with the current
registry, leaving you with an absolute mess of old and new registry keys.
--
Please respond in the same thread.
Regards, Jim Byrd, MS-MVP
In
J
Jordan
With all due respect Jim, browsing with IE and using OE as one's mail/news
client are fraught with danger and I'm sure you still do it. I've seen this
same ominous anti-registry cleaner post from you on several occasions but
have never seen you advise against using IE or OE. Registry Cleaners have
improved greatly over the last few years and for the most part are quite
safe. But I do agree with your advice to use Erunt to backup the Registry
before a registry cleaning is done. However, the ultimate safety net is to
image your drive regularly.
client are fraught with danger and I'm sure you still do it. I've seen this
same ominous anti-registry cleaner post from you on several occasions but
have never seen you advise against using IE or OE. Registry Cleaners have
improved greatly over the last few years and for the most part are quite
safe. But I do agree with your advice to use Erunt to backup the Registry
before a registry cleaning is done. However, the ultimate safety net is to
image your drive regularly.
J
Jim Byrd
Hi Jordan - Well, I don't usually engage in these debates, but in this case
a few comments may be useful.
First, while drive imaging is a very useful backup capability, it has some
drawbacks compared with a EDUNT/ERDNT save/restore under certain
circumstances (time, for example, when all you really want to do is to
backup the Registry prior to a trial installation of some non-suspect
software in case something goes wrong and you don't need to take the time to
do a full TotalUninstall, or the fact that many users won't have the
necessary drive space available and/or haven't a clue about how to install a
secondary drive, etc.)
Next, as I said, my comments are based on my experience - YMMV, and you're
certainly free to use what you like; however, I would be very surprised if
you could find a single MVP or other computer maintainer/fixer who will
advocate the use of any reg cleaner - we see too many screwed up machines
caused in part by their non-judicious use, and I, for one, don't consider
them "quite safe" at all outside of the hands of an experienced,
knowledgable user. It's one of the first things one asks a client about.
Lastly, if IE and OE are setup and used properly, a couple of preventative
programs installed and the associated OS properly patched, using them is
hardly "fraught with danger". I've used both since the very first versions
came out, and, while it does take a little attention, I've never had malware
on any of my machines from this source from 5.5 onward, although I've
certainly gotten some from deceptive installs. (Contrary to your assertion,
although not in these newsgroups, I do upon occasion recommend having
Firefox available as an alternative to IE, although I don't recommend an
alternative to OE yet - there simply isn't anything good enough available
IMO.
)
--
Please respond in the same thread.
Regards, Jim Byrd, MS-MVP
In
a few comments may be useful.
First, while drive imaging is a very useful backup capability, it has some
drawbacks compared with a EDUNT/ERDNT save/restore under certain
circumstances (time, for example, when all you really want to do is to
backup the Registry prior to a trial installation of some non-suspect
software in case something goes wrong and you don't need to take the time to
do a full TotalUninstall, or the fact that many users won't have the
necessary drive space available and/or haven't a clue about how to install a
secondary drive, etc.)
Next, as I said, my comments are based on my experience - YMMV, and you're
certainly free to use what you like; however, I would be very surprised if
you could find a single MVP or other computer maintainer/fixer who will
advocate the use of any reg cleaner - we see too many screwed up machines
caused in part by their non-judicious use, and I, for one, don't consider
them "quite safe" at all outside of the hands of an experienced,
knowledgable user. It's one of the first things one asks a client about.
Lastly, if IE and OE are setup and used properly, a couple of preventative
programs installed and the associated OS properly patched, using them is
hardly "fraught with danger". I've used both since the very first versions
came out, and, while it does take a little attention, I've never had malware
on any of my machines from this source from 5.5 onward, although I've
certainly gotten some from deceptive installs. (Contrary to your assertion,
although not in these newsgroups, I do upon occasion recommend having
Firefox available as an alternative to IE, although I don't recommend an
alternative to OE yet - there simply isn't anything good enough available
IMO.
)--
Please respond in the same thread.
Regards, Jim Byrd, MS-MVP
In
J
Jordan
Jim,
I just re-read my post and I do apologize for the negative tone. You have
been a valuable resource for me and many others for a long time and I thank
you.
I recommend less aggressive registry cleaners to less experienced users. I
recommend Firefox to everybody. And OE, properly configured, is my mail
client of choice.
Regards,
I just re-read my post and I do apologize for the negative tone. You have
been a valuable resource for me and many others for a long time and I thank
you.
I recommend less aggressive registry cleaners to less experienced users. I
recommend Firefox to everybody. And OE, properly configured, is my mail
client of choice.
Regards,
A
Al Smith
Hello All,
Easy Cleaner 2.0.6.369 is good, and free. It tries to connect to
the Internet each time it is started, but can be blocked with a
firewall (not XP's sad excuse for a firewall, though), so no big
deal there. It has many other useful tools.
RegScrubXP 3.25 also seems to work well. It's just a straight
registry cleaner.
To keep track of stuff installed in your registry by programs you
install, RegCleaner 4.3.80 is excellent. It helps clean up entries
programs leave behind in the registry after they uninstall.
It wouldn't do you any harm at all to download and install all
three of these excellent tools.
Easy Cleaner 2.0.6.369 is good, and free. It tries to connect to
the Internet each time it is started, but can be blocked with a
firewall (not XP's sad excuse for a firewall, though), so no big
deal there. It has many other useful tools.
RegScrubXP 3.25 also seems to work well. It's just a straight
registry cleaner.
To keep track of stuff installed in your registry by programs you
install, RegCleaner 4.3.80 is excellent. It helps clean up entries
programs leave behind in the registry after they uninstall.
It wouldn't do you any harm at all to download and install all
three of these excellent tools.
J
Jim Byrd
YW, Jordan - no offense was taken, and it's certainly a "discussable" issue,
one that occurs quite frequently here.
--
Please respond in the same thread.
Regards, Jim Byrd, MS-MVP
In
one that occurs quite frequently here.
--
Please respond in the same thread.
Regards, Jim Byrd, MS-MVP
In