Is my Windows XP Registry too big?

[Telenochek]

Dear all,

My windows registry size is 350MB. I do have a lot of CAD (computer
aided design) programs installed, but I was just wondering if this
affects performance of my computer.

Also, is there any need to remove unused entries? I was searching
through the registry for a certain key, and stumbled upon record of a
program that has been uninstalled more than 3 years ago.

RegistryFix 6.2 does not find this entry.

Any suggestions to clean up the registry are welcome...
I am not afraid to ruin my OS (using Norton Ghost with multiple hard
drive images).

Is cleaning out records like the above from the registry going to
help?

Thanks!

 

[Bob Harris]

Are you sure that is just the registry, and not all of Documents and Settings? If only the registry, then 350MB is very large.

The XP registry is contained in several pieces, or hives.

Some are located in \Documents and Settings\user_name\ntuser.dat. And, each has a backup, called ntuser.bak

Other parts are located under windows\system32\config\ with names like DEFAULT, SAM, SECURITY, SOFTWARE, and SYSTEM. Again, there is usually one *.bak version of each.

Microsoft has more info at: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/256986/

Typical sizes of these files, form my installation of XP home, with many Gig of installed programs:

36,962,304 SOFTWARE
6,553,600 SYSTEM
1,572,864 DEFAULT
24,576 SAM
450,560 SECURITY
14,942,208 ntuser.dat

It is hard to say whether registry size and/or fragmentation really impacts the execution of programs, but there are many registry cleaners and defraggers, so I suspect that someone believes that it matters.

So long as you have the ability to restore things via GHOST, you could experiment with registry cleaners. However, I would advise against manully editting the registry, or at least save that as a last resort.

Registry programs I have used:

Norton Utilities, WinDoctor (part of System Works) -- not free -- fairly safe, non-agressive cleaner.

CCleaner, registry icon -- Free from http://www.ccleaner.com/ -- cleans somewhat more than Norton.

Perfect Companion -- not free -- once cleaned too much and caused another program to stop working, altough in fiarness to Perfect Companion, that other program was using a "bad" registry key as part of a copy-protection scheme.

Auslogic Registry Defrag -- free from http://www.auslogics.com/registry-defrag -- not a cleaner, but something to reduce the siz eof the registry after cleaning, or after a lot of installs/uninstalls.

Other registry tools can be found via links at: http://www.majorgeeks.com/downloads15.html

 

[PA Bear [MS MVP]]

Think your Registry needs "cleaning"? Read
http://aumha.net/viewtopic.php?t=28099 and draw your own conclusions.

 

[Frank Saunders MS-MVP IE,OE/WM]

Dear all,

My windows registry size is 350MB. I do have a lot of CAD (computer
aided design) programs installed, but I was just wondering if this
affects performance of my computer.

Also, is there any need to remove unused entries? I was searching
through the registry for a certain key, and stumbled upon record of a
program that has been uninstalled more than 3 years ago.

RegistryFix 6.2 does not find this entry.

Any suggestions to clean up the registry are welcome...
I am not afraid to ruin my OS (using Norton Ghost with multiple hard
drive images).

Is cleaning out records like the above from the registry going to
help?

Thanks!

Think your Registry needs "cleaning"? Read
http://aumha.net/viewtopic.php?t=28099 and draw your own conclusions.

 

[Uncle Grumpy]

My windows registry size is 350MB. I do have a lot of CAD (computer
aided design) programs installed, but I was just wondering if this
affects performance of my computer.

In this case, size DOES NOT matter.

 

[PA Bear [MS MVP]]

Frank Saunders MS-MVP IE,OE/WM wrote:

Think your Registry needs "cleaning"? Read
http://aumha.net/viewtopic.php?t=28099 and draw your own conclusions.

SNAP!