scared to edit registry!!

[jarsek]

Hi,

I once had software called Winamp installed. I no longer wanted it so went
through the proper uninstall process and it all went smoothly. However now
when I boot up and log into Vista I get a little error message saying
there's a problem with winamp and that I should re-install to rectify it!
it has an OK button that gets rid of the message. It's not causing any
problems but it's beginning to annoy me!

I have tried CCleaner to clean up the registry and it did find many
references to winamp and it cleaned it all up but despite that the darned
message persists! I had a look in regedit and clicked to find instances of
winamp and there are lots of keys. I was very tempted to just delete them
all. Would this be foolhardy or would it solve my problem?

Many thanks!!


Jim (Glasgow UK)

 

[Shenan Stanley]

Hi,

I once had software called Winamp installed. I no longer wanted it
so went through the proper uninstall process and it all went
smoothly. However now when I boot up and log into Vista I get a
little error message saying there's a problem with winamp and that
I should re-install to rectify it! it has an OK button that gets
rid of the message. It's not causing any problems but it's
beginning to annoy me!
I have tried CCleaner to clean up the registry and it did find many
references to winamp and it cleaned it all up but despite that the
darned message persists! I had a look in regedit and clicked to
find instances of winamp and there are lots of keys. I was very
tempted to just delete them all. Would this be foolhardy or would
it solve my problem?
Many thanks!!


Jim (Glasgow UK)

What made you first go to the registry?

Anything just in the STARTUP folder?

Speaking of the registry - anything in the RUN key(s) of the registry for
Current User and/or Local Machine?

 

[housetrained]

if nothing else works re-install winamp and then uninstall it - this time it
should thoroughly uninstall

 

[jarsek]

DL and run this
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.aspx

Most likely you will find the offending program in
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run

As you peruse thru, you can right click on any entry, and select search
online to find details.
You can disable it first with the check box, and if that safely does the
trick, you may then delete the entry.
After that, CCleaner will clean those registry entries if you so desire.

What a useful little utility!!! It has fixed my problem! Thank you for
sharing this - I'm very grateful!!

Jim

 

[jarsek]

I considered doing that but another contributor has now come up with the
perfect solution!

Thanks anway for the thought!

Jim

 

[jarsek]

What made you first go to the registry?

Anything just in the STARTUP folder?

Speaking of the registry - anything in the RUN key(s) of the registry for
Current User and/or Local Machine?

I did go to the msconfig to see if it was in the startup but it wasn't. It
wasn't even there while it was installed!

Anyway "Death" has pointed me to a very useful utility and I unchecked the
box for Orb's winamp and I rebooted and Success!!

I am well pleased and thanks for your response.

Jim

 

[Shenan Stanley]

What a useful little utility!!! It has fixed my problem! Thank
you for sharing this - I'm very grateful!!

Did you also actually go in and remove the entry?

 

[jarsek]

Did you also actually go in and remove the entry?

Err - no... since the annoying message was no longer appearing I was happy
with that. Do you think I should?

 

[Gene E. Bloch]

Err - no... since the annoying message was no longer appearing I was happy
with that. Do you think I should?

Not necessary.

However, maybe the utility (which you didn't identify) will tell you where
the entry is and (if you're using Autoruns) it will even uninstall it for
you, IIRC.