Registry cleaner ?

[Bruce Chambers]

Kim Komando's tip of the day (07 Jan) has good words for
Microcraft's jv Power tools for cleaning the registry. I
believe it's freeware.

Has anyone used this program? Do you have any remarks or
recomendations?
Jack from Taxacola (formerly Pensacola), FL

Why would you even think you'd ever need to clean your registry?
What specific *problems* are you actually experiencing (not some
program's bogus listing of imaginary problems) that you think can be
fixed by using a registry "cleaner?"

If you do have a problem that is rooted in the registry, it would
be far better to simply edit (after backing up, of course) only the
specific key(s) and/or value(s) that are causing the problem. After
all, why use a chainsaw when a scalpel will do the job? Additionally,
the manually changing of one or two registry entries is far less likely
to have the dire consequences of allowing an automated product to make
multiple changes simultaneously. The only thing needed to safely clean
your registry is knowledge and Regedit.exe.

The registry contains all of the operating system's "knowledge" of
the computer's hardware devices, installed software, the location of the
device drivers, and the computer's configuration. A misstep in the
registry can have severe consequences. One should not even turning
loose a poorly understood automated "cleaner," unless he is fully
confident that he knows *exactly* what is going to happen as a result of
each and every change.

Having repeatedly seen the results of inexperienced people using
automated registry "cleaners," I can only advise all but the most
experienced computer technicians (and/or hobbyists) to avoid them all.
Experience has shown me that such tools simply are not safe in the hands
of the inexperienced user. If you lack the knowledge and experience to
maintain your registry by yourself, then you also lack the knowledge and
experience to safely configure and use any automated registry cleaner,
no matter how safe they claim to be.

More importantly, no one has ever demonstrated that the use of an
automated registry "cleaner," particularly by an untrained,
inexperienced computer user, does any real good, whatsoever. There's
certainly been no empirical evidence offered to demonstrate that the use
of such products to "clean" WinXP's registry improves a computer's
performance or stability. Given the potential for harm, it's just not
worth the risk.

Granted, most registry "cleaners" won't cause problems each and
every time they're used, but the potential for harm is always there.
And, since no registry "cleaner" has ever been demonstrated to do any
good (think of them like treating the flu with chicken soup - there's no
real medicinal value, but it sometimes provides a warming placebo
effect), I always tell people that the risks far out-weigh the
non-existent benefits.

I will concede that a good registry *scanning* tool, in the hands
of an experienced and knowledgeable technician or hobbyist can be a
useful time-saving diagnostic tool, as long as it's not allowed to make
any changes automatically. But I really don't think that there are any
registry "cleaners" that are truly safe for the general public to use.
Experience has proven just the opposite: such tools simply are not safe
in the hands of the inexperienced user.

A little further reading on the subject:

Why I don't use registry cleaners
http://www.edbott.com/weblog/?p=643

AumHa Forums • View topic - AUMHA Discussion: Should I Use a Registry
Cleaner?
http://aumha.net/viewtopic.php?t=28099



--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:


http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/555375

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. ~Benjamin Franklin

Many people would rather die than think; in fact, most do. ~Bertrand Russell

The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has
killed a great many philosophers.
~ Denis Diderot

 

[Steve Hayes]

From: "Jackson" <[email protected]>

| Kim Komando's tip of the day (07 Jan) has good words for
| Microcraft's jv Power tools for cleaning the registry. I
| believe it's freeware.

| Has anyone used this program? Do you have any remarks or
| recomendations?
| Jack from Taxacola (formerly Pensacola), FL

Rulle of thumb...

Do NOT use so-called Registry Cleaners !

So how should you clean the registry, then?

 

[Steve Hayes]

As usual and in your true form when ever these useless programs are
exposed for what they are you are here to defend your beloved cleaners
and to insult all who disagree with you. However, when people post
seeking help with real problems caused by these cleaners you are nowhere
to been seen. Most of us here have noticed that when it comes to posts
about registry cleaners you have a case of selected blindness, and when
you do reply to posts you usually leave your brains and manners parked
somewhere else.

None of which tells us ANYTHING about why you think we should not use registry
cleaners, and what harm you think they do.

 

[Bruce Chambers]

So how should you clean the registry, then?

And the correct answer to that question is: "You shouldn't." There's
no sound technical reason for doing so, but abundant technical reasons
for *not* doing so.


--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:


http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/555375

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary
safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. ~Benjamin Franklin

Many people would rather die than think; in fact, most do. ~Bertrand Russell

The philosopher has never killed any priests, whereas the priest has
killed a great many philosophers.
~ Denis Diderot

 

[David H. Lipman]

From: "Steve Hayes" <[email protected]>

| On Thu, 7 Jan 2010 06:48:54 -0500, "David H. Lipman"

| So how should you clean the registry, then?


You don't. There is no need to clean the Registry. It is a myth to sell snake oil. Very
often these so-called Registry Cleaners are malware.

 

[John John - MVP]

None of which tells us ANYTHING about why you think we should not use registry
cleaners, and what harm you think they do.

http://groups.google.com/group/micr...9fc55c84159/f9b2f696ca1b9462#f9b2f696ca1b9462
http://boards.msn.com/safetyboards/thread.aspx?threadid=1009500&boardsparam=PostID=28824491
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/topic110399.html
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;299958
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/888637
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/247678
http://groups.google.com/group/micr.../thread/6b333372c870ea74/43b0f73c7b89f3ba?q=#
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/951950
http://groups.google.com/group/micr...bbeldygook+Computer+unusable#6e931aaebff35bc6

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-vista/Are-registry-cleaners-necessary
http://www.edbott.com/weblog/archives/000643.html

They do absolutely nothing to improve performance and reliability of NT
installations and they can and do cause problem. Along with that many
of them carry pests and malware and others are fraudware, you install
them and they muck up your computer and the scam artists who wrote these
snake oil programs try to extort money from you to remove their pests
from your computer. Why bother?

John

 

[Steve Hayes]

From: "Steve Hayes" <[email protected]>

| On Thu, 7 Jan 2010 06:48:54 -0500, "David H. Lipman"


| So how should you clean the registry, then?


You don't. There is no need to clean the Registry. It is a myth to sell snake oil. Very
often these so-called Registry Cleaners are malware.

So it's OK for the registry to grow and grow, with redundant and outdated
entries?

 

[Bruce Hagen]

So it's OK for the registry to grow and grow, with redundant and
outdated
entries?


--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://hayesfam.bravehost.com/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://methodius.blogspot.com
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full
stop uk

Hundreds, or even thousands, of defunct registry entries should not even
be noticed as far as performance is concerned. If you get rid of a
problematic program, Norton for example, then you would want to use the
removal tool for that issue. Many programs have removal tools or
instructions to get rid of all aspects the program.

Registry cleaners sound like a good idea like needless e-mail scanning,
but it is like playing Russian Roulette. Someday, you may well regret it.

Read this before running a registry cleaner and then make your mind up.
http://aumha.net/viewtopic.php?t=28099

 

[Olórin]

You "rulle" of thumb is as good as its spelling.

People who make an issue of what is clearly a typo on someone else's part
but make one themselves when they do so - always a giggle.

Try removing the plank from "you" own eye first!

 

[sandy58]

- What is currently wrong or failing with the registry?
- What convinced you that the registry needs to be "cleaned" up?
- What constitutes the "cleaning" actions?
- What do you expect to gain from the cleanup?
- What are you going to do if the registry changes hose over
  your computer since a restore may not be possible?
- What is your recovery strategy from the registry changes?

*_Why the uneducated or lazy should never use registry cleaners_*

If YOU are not adept at *manually* editing the registry, don't use a tool
that you don't understand regarding its proposed changes.  Regardless of
relinquishing the task to software, YOU are the final authority in allowing
it to make the changes.  Any registry cleaner that does not request forYOU
to give permission to make its proposed changes along with listing each
proposed change should be discarded.

Do you have a backup & restore plan in place?  When (and not if) the
registry cleaner corrupts your registry and when you can no longer boot into
Windows, just how are you going to restore that OS partition so it is usable
again?  Even if you use a registry cleaner that provides for backups ofits
changes so you can revert back to the prior state, how are you going to
perform that restore if you cannot boot the OS after hosing over its
registry?  What about entries in the registry that look to be orphaned under
the current OS load instance but are used under a different OS environment?
You delete what looks orphaned only to find out that they are required under
a different environment.

Say there was an unusually high amount of orphaned entries in your registry,
like 4MB.  By deleting the orphaned entries, you would speed up how long it
takes Windows to load the registry's files when it starts up - by all of
maybe 1 second.  Oooh, aaah.  All that risk of modifying the registryto
save maybe a second, or less, during the Windows startup.  Most folks that
clean the registry end up deleting only 10KB, or less.  They are doing
nothing to improve their Windows load time.  Since the registry is onlyread
from the memory copy of it, and since memory is random access, there is no
difference to read one byte of the registry (in memory) from the another
byte in the registry (also in memory).  The extra data in memory for
orphaned entries has no effect on the time to retrieve items from the memory
copy of the registry because orphaned entries are never retrieved (if they
were, they aren't orphaned).

Cleaning the registry will NOT improve performance in reading from the
memory copy of the registry.  The reduced size of the registry's .dat files
might reduce the load time of Windows by all of a second and probably much
less.  And you want to risk the stability of your OS for inconsequential
changes to its registry?  The same boobs that get suckered into these
registry cleanup "tools" are the same ones that get suckered into the memory
defragment "tools".

A registry cleaner should only be used if you by yourself can correctly
cleanup the registry.  The cleaner is just a tool to automate the same
process but you should know every change that it intends to make and
understand each of those changes.  After all, and regardless of the stagnant
expertise that is hard coded into the utility, *YOU* are the final authority
in what registry changes are performed whether you do it manually or witha
utility.  If YOU do not understand the proposed change (which requires the
product actually divulge the proposed change before committing that change),
how will you know whether or not to allow that change?

Rather a brash statement:
"If YOU are not adept at *manually* editing the registry, don't use a
tool
that you don't understand regarding its proposed changes. "
Does that mean you personally can MANUALLY fix Corrupt files, do a
Spellcheck, do a full Search, take/make a Snapshot, do the job of a
Translator...withOUT using software? Behave, laddie. You MAY be Good
but you AIN'T God......YET!

 

[Unknown]

Don't clean it. It is not required.

So how should you clean the registry, then?


--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://hayesfam.bravehost.com/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://methodius.blogspot.com
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop
uk

 

[Unknown]

You won't live long enough for it to grow and grow and have an effect on
your computer.

 

[Unknown]

What harm they do??? THINK, how would you write or create a registry
cleaner? How would you the
programmer know unequivocally whether an item is an orphan or not? What
happens if the cleaner
inadvertently deletes something that is absolutely needed. This is usually
the case. AND, if you didn't know
if an entry is valid or not what do you do with it?.

 

[Unknown]

VanguardLH said it correctly. If you are inept at editing the registry
manually don't use a program to do
it for you. His post was well said and educational.
But, Sandy58, this has absolutely nothing to do with fixing corrupt files,
do a spell-check, do a full search,
take/make a snapshot, etc. Perhaps, you have no idea what a registry is?

- What is currently wrong or failing with the registry?
- What convinced you that the registry needs to be "cleaned" up?
- What constitutes the "cleaning" actions?
- What do you expect to gain from the cleanup?
- What are you going to do if the registry changes hose over
your computer since a restore may not be possible?
- What is your recovery strategy from the registry changes?

*_Why the uneducated or lazy should never use registry cleaners_*

If YOU are not adept at *manually* editing the registry, don't use a tool
that you don't understand regarding its proposed changes. Regardless of
relinquishing the task to software, YOU are the final authority in
allowing
it to make the changes. Any registry cleaner that does not request for YOU
to give permission to make its proposed changes along with listing each
proposed change should be discarded.

Do you have a backup & restore plan in place? When (and not if) the
registry cleaner corrupts your registry and when you can no longer boot
into
Windows, just how are you going to restore that OS partition so it is
usable
again? Even if you use a registry cleaner that provides for backups of its
changes so you can revert back to the prior state, how are you going to
perform that restore if you cannot boot the OS after hosing over its
registry? What about entries in the registry that look to be orphaned
under
the current OS load instance but are used under a different OS
environment?
You delete what looks orphaned only to find out that they are required
under
a different environment.

Say there was an unusually high amount of orphaned entries in your
registry,
like 4MB. By deleting the orphaned entries, you would speed up how long it
takes Windows to load the registry's files when it starts up - by all of
maybe 1 second. Oooh, aaah. All that risk of modifying the registry to
save maybe a second, or less, during the Windows startup. Most folks that
clean the registry end up deleting only 10KB, or less. They are doing
nothing to improve their Windows load time. Since the registry is only
read
from the memory copy of it, and since memory is random access, there is no
difference to read one byte of the registry (in memory) from the another
byte in the registry (also in memory). The extra data in memory for
orphaned entries has no effect on the time to retrieve items from the
memory
copy of the registry because orphaned entries are never retrieved (if they
were, they aren't orphaned).

Cleaning the registry will NOT improve performance in reading from the
memory copy of the registry. The reduced size of the registry's .dat files
might reduce the load time of Windows by all of a second and probably much
less. And you want to risk the stability of your OS for inconsequential
changes to its registry? The same boobs that get suckered into these
registry cleanup "tools" are the same ones that get suckered into the
memory
defragment "tools".

A registry cleaner should only be used if you by yourself can correctly
cleanup the registry. The cleaner is just a tool to automate the same
process but you should know every change that it intends to make and
understand each of those changes. After all, and regardless of the
stagnant
expertise that is hard coded into the utility, *YOU* are the final
authority
in what registry changes are performed whether you do it manually or with
a
utility. If YOU do not understand the proposed change (which requires the
product actually divulge the proposed change before committing that
change),
how will you know whether or not to allow that change?

Rather a brash statement:
"If YOU are not adept at *manually* editing the registry, don't use a
tool
that you don't understand regarding its proposed changes. "
Does that mean you personally can MANUALLY fix Corrupt files, do a
Spellcheck, do a full Search, take/make a Snapshot, do the job of a
Translator...withOUT using software? Behave, laddie. You MAY be Good
but you AIN'T God......YET!

 

[thanatoid]

| OK, I'll bite... Why?

Because the need for one is a myth

I just LOVE specific replies! Bravo!

Use can cause MORE problems than they purport to solve.
Problems that can be catastrophic.

I /could/ ask for an example but judging by your "reply" to my
first question, I don't see much point.

 

[thanatoid]

I'll post where ever I want and if you don't like it don't
bother reading my posts.

Huh? You talkin' to me?

What good, pray tell, has a registry cleaner ever done for
you?

At various times, it has removed between 25-500 useless entries,
reduced the registry size by 5%-20%, defragged it, and gave me
the kind of good feeling we anal-retentives enjoy having.

Like all the other believers out there you put some
kind of blind faith or voodoo trust in them and because
your registry cleaner has found and removed a couple

Not "couple", between 25-500 per session, depending on how many
stupid programs written by morons I have tried and "uninstalled"
in the meantime.

of
orphaned registry entries it gives you a warm fuzzy feeling
and you think that it's doing something useful.

I do think that's useful. You are welcome to disagree.

Your question says it all, "WHAT, pray tell, has one done
to any of YOUR systems that you could not undo with the
backup files...".

Too bad you can't answer that question. The truth - as I have
seen it in all my time on the Usenet (this subject tends to be
recurrent) - is that of all the peoploids carping on about how
BAD Reg Cleaners are, not ONE has ever been able to give me an
example of ANYTHING that got ****ed up.

That is the gist of it all. Why bother
with programs that at best do nothing other than give you a
fuzzy feeling

Hey, my life sucks, I take what I can get.

and that at worst will cause problems
requiring you to restore registry files?

E X A M P L E P L E A S E.

That is if the
registry cleaner can even restore its own backup (often
they can't)

Why do you keep on inventing shit? Admit it, you've never even
used one.

or if it hasn't crippled the installation to
the point where the Windows can't boot properly.

And this has happened to you H O W many time, exactly?

Right.

These
cleaners are next to utterly useless and the purposed non
existent benefits parroted by the vendors and fans of these
programs are simply not worth the risk of the real damages
that these programs can and do sometimes cause.

A G A I N, E X A M P L E P L E A S E.

Or, just STFU.

And don't top post.

 

[thanatoid]

People who make an issue of what is clearly a typo

"Rulke" would be more of a /typo/. I am sure he knows there's
only one "l" but I am not sure he has heard of spell checkers.
That is one typo any one of them WOULD have caught.

on someone else's part but make one themselves when they do so
- always a giggle.

I am always happy to provide amusement.

Try removing the plank from "you" own eye first!

I likes me planks, Mr. Wizard. And at least I /use/ my spell-
checker.

 

[sandy58]

From: "Steve Hayes" <[email protected]>

| On Thu, 7 Jan 2010 06:48:54 -0500, "David H. Lipman"



| So how should you clean the registry, then?

You don't.  There is no need to clean the Registry.  It is a myth to sell snake oil.  Very
often these so-called Registry Cleaners are malware.

"Very often these so-called Registry Cleaners are malware. "
As are some AV programs....and your point is? It's a personal choice
whether or not to use a reg program.
You believe in the "snake oil" theory (and that's all it is, a
THEORY.) no-one here has yet mentioned specifics. Name of program/what
it did wrong/resulting chaos etc. It's all very well slagging away
but, like politicians, smoke & mirrors/hot air. A great percentage of
negative posters here have been persuaded by the other negative
posters. Not one of them has a positive example of damage inflicted on
a system.
NOW we should see loads of 2nd- & 3rd-hand examples of how PC's have
been totalled through using Registry Cleaners.

 

[Etaoin Shrdlu]

I just LOVE specific replies! Bravo!


I /could/ ask for an example but judging by your "reply" to my
first question, I don't see much point.

What you haven't done, for all of your posturing, is tell why you think
registry cleaning is a good idea. We know that there's always a chance
that a neophyte will "clean" something that will result in trouble, and
even if the chance is remote, there must be something that makes the
risk worthwhile. If you just want to clean out orphaned entries because
their presence bothers you, that's a personal neurosis and not evidence
of efficacy. Do you believe that large numbers of orphaned entries cause
a problem (such as significantly slowing down the system) other than
their mere presence? If so, what objective evidence do you have? Note
that "I know my system's faster after registry cleaning" isn't objective
evidence.

 

[Unknown]

You don't see much of anything.

I just LOVE specific replies! Bravo!


I /could/ ask for an example but judging by your "reply" to my
first question, I don't see much point.