Registry Cleaners. A question ..

[Lou]

I hear all sorts of horrendous stories about the actions and potential
dangers of registry cleaners. I use Registry Mechanic and have found
it to be effective and reliable. I am told that it could create mayhem
on my HD.

Anyone any experience with this and other reg cleaners?

Lou.

 

[Dave Patrick]

Unless you have some compelling reason to do so it's best to leave the
registry intact.

--

Regards,

Dave Patrick ....Please no email replies - reply in newsgroup.
Microsoft Certified Professional
Microsoft MVP [Windows]
http://www.microsoft.com/protect

:
|I hear all sorts of horrendous stories about the actions and potential
| dangers of registry cleaners. I use Registry Mechanic and have found
| it to be effective and reliable. I am told that it could create mayhem
| on my HD.
|
| Anyone any experience with this and other reg cleaners?
|
| Lou.

 

[Guest]

I have been using Ace Utilities on my computers with no problems at all.
Jim

 

[=?iso-8859-1?Q?Daniel_Mart=EDn?=]

There is no need to clean the registry, performance is not severely affected by registry size and registry cleaners can't be sure if a registry key should be deleted or not, they have not enough 'application knowledge' to act safely.

In my opinion cleaning the registry has more disadvantages than advantages.

 

[Ken Blake, MVP]

I hear all sorts of horrendous stories about the actions and potential
dangers of registry cleaners. I use Registry Mechanic and have found
it to be effective and reliable. I am told that it could create mayhem
on my HD.

Most registry cleaners work OK most of the time, and problems *are* rare.
The point isn't that they always cause problems, the point is that they
*can* sometimes cause problems.

Moreover, the registry doesn't need to be cleaned. Extra registry entries
don't hurt you. The risk of a registry cleaner hurting you (deleting an
entry you need) isn't necessarily enormous, but it's much greater than any
potential benefit it may have.

Think of it as something like russian roulette with a revolver with 1,000
chambers. Most of the time you get away with it, but it never helps you, and
if you get that one loaded chamber...For that reason, I recommend against
their use.

 

[Mike Hall \(MS-MVP\)]

Lou

In addition to what others have told you, registry cleaners do NOT clean ALL
of the registry.. they tend to remove absolutely safe stuff and that is
about it.. this is true of all registry cleaners, past and present..

 

[Lou]

There is no need to clean the registry, performance is not
severely affected by registry size and registry cleaners can't
be sure if a registry key should be deleted or not, they have
not enough 'application knowledge' to act safely.
In my opinion cleaning the registry has more disadvantages
than advantages.

Prior to running Registry Mechanic my PC was freezing, crashing,
re-booting at least two to three times a month with a consequent
loss of data. It also got much slower. Since running the application
in question, 6 months now, I have had no problems whatsoever
with my PC and it runs faster. So far. It appears to me that it works
for me.

However, there would appear to be disadvantages and problems
associated with registry cleaners. I would like to hear from those
who have experienced similliar advantages as well as disadvantages.
I would also like to hear other folks experience with other cleaners.

Thanks for your contribution.

Lou

 

[Someone]

I was using Registry Mechanic and Diskeeper when my puter failed. I could
not even start it with a start-up disc. I don't know if either was
responsible.

 

[Marc]

I hear all sorts of horrendous stories about the actions and potential
dangers of registry cleaners. I use Registry Mechanic and have found
it to be effective and reliable. I am told that it could create mayhem
on my HD.

Anyone any experience with this and other reg cleaners?

Lou.

What good does "cleaning" your registry do?

You're better of going for more specific solutions, e.g. if there's an
entry in add/remove programs that wont remove itself get software that
can specificly do that - rather than let some software loose on your
system settings.

 

[Hoppy]

Hi Lou ...

I'm surprised by the negative responses you received. Personally, I believe
the registry requires routine cleaning, especially when a system is treated
the way I do; i.e., lots & lots of program installs and uninstalls. You can
read another more credible man's (Fred Langa) opinions here:

"Testing 10 Windows 'Registry Cleaning' Software Packs":
http://www.informationweek.com/story/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=171203805

"How Do You Know What [Is] Safe To Clean From the Registry?" and
"More Reg Tool Pro/Con" :
http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2005/2005-10-20.htm#2

"Reg Cleaner Follow-Up" :
http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2005/2005-11-03.htm#2

Mr. Langa's tests may be a tad over-simplified, but they provide a very nice
guideline. I use his top two cleaners but disagree with his evaluation of
Registry First Aid -- which takes a heck of a lot longer (because it seems
to go deeper and may not be as "smart").

You always need to be very careful when cleaning the registry. As far as
I'm concerned, you'd be crazy if you didn't image your drives beforehand.

HTH,
Hoppy
~~

:
I hear all sorts of horrendous stories about the actions and potential
dangers of registry cleaners. I use Registry Mechanic and have found
it to be effective and reliable. I am told that it could create mayhem
on my HD.

Anyone any experience with this and other reg cleaners?

Lou.

 

[Hoppy]

Oops ... here's another of Fred Langa's articles that you may find of
interest :

"Where does Registry Bloat Come From?" :
http://www.langa.com/newsletters/2005/2005-10-13.htm#1

Note that at the end of the article, Mr. Langa says, "Everyone can benefit
from regular use of a Registry cleaner-- but let me help you avoid the bad
ones so you won't end up in worse shape than when you started!"

--
Hoppy
~~

:
I hear all sorts of horrendous stories about the actions and potential
dangers of registry cleaners. I use Registry Mechanic and have found
it to be effective and reliable. I am told that it could create mayhem
on my HD.

Anyone any experience with this and other reg cleaners?

Lou.

 

[Kerry Brown]

I hear all sorts of horrendous stories about the actions and potential
dangers of registry cleaners. I use Registry Mechanic and have found
it to be effective and reliable. I am told that it could create mayhem
on my HD.

Anyone any experience with this and other reg cleaners?

Lou.

Registry cleaners were a necessary evil with 9x version of Windows. The
registry in NT versions of Windows is processed and stored quite
differently. The benefits of using a registry cleaner with NT versions of
Windows are not enough to overcome the possible disastrous consequences. I
have repeatedly challenged the manufacturers of such programs to show me a
third party study that proves their claims of fixing Windows problems and
speeding up Windows. To date I've had one response. They showed me very
outdated material from Microsoft on how NT 4.0 accessed the registry. The
material had nothing in it to prove their claims. They also showed a review
of their program which they obviously hadn't read as the best thing the
reviewer had to say about their program was it did no harm while he was
using it and he didn't recommend it.

I sometimes a registry cleaner program to help find leftover entries from a
Norton Antivirus uninstall. Even using their downlaodable uninstaller
doesn't always get rid of everything I am an expert user with much
experience doing this. I could do it manually but it is quicker to use the
cleaner program. I always use the cleaner in manual mode.

I have seen many customer's machines brought in for repairs after using a
registry cleaner program. In fairness the pc's are usually riddled with
malware so the cleaner was not the root of the problem but it did compound
the problem.

Kerry

 

[Crystal]

With the advent of spyware and how fast it spreads and infects, registry
cleaning is necessary. Every spyware removal programs, the good ones, in a
sense, is a registry cleaner.

 

[Jim Byrd]

Hi Lou - 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.martau.com/tu.html or free direct dwnld here:
http://digilander.libero.it/molearchive3/tun235.zip or here:
http://freeware4u.com/modules/mydownloads/singlefile.php?lid=234, in the
first place.) (As an aside, there are, however, some third party Registry
Editors which can be of great help with both the incorrect uninstall and
with certain malware problems, especially some of theCoolWebSearch types
such as the AppInit_DLLs variant of the about:blank version of CWS, for
example. I can recommend Registrar Lite, here:
http://www.resplendence.com/reglite .)

There are a couple of specific bugs that can cause abnormal growth in either
the System or Software hives; however, they are rare, and unless these hives
in %SystemRoot%\System32\config are very, very large (in the hundreds of
megabytes), then I would council you to leave your Registry alone except for
the special circumstances I mentioned above.

I and most other MVP's that I know believe that Registry modifications of
any type are probably best done manually, very carefully, with a thorough
knowledge of what's installed on your machine, and what you're doing, and
then only when necessary. There's very little (if any!) noticeable benefit
in either space saving or speed achievable by cleaning out the Registry
except in those few cases where there's a specific problem the client is
experiencing (usually uninstall or malware related in my experience) that
needs to be fixed.

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://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/erunt/ 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://www.larshederer.homepage.t-online.de/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.

 

[Wesley Vogel]

Registry Cleaners are like any other tool, they can be dangerous if the
operator does not know what they are doing.

A chainsaw can be safe if used properly.

--
Hope this helps. Let us know.

Wes
MS-MVP Windows Shell/User

In

 

[Lou]

You always need to be very careful when cleaning the registry. As far as
I'm concerned, you'd be crazy if you didn't image your drives beforehand.

Thanks. Very helpful.

Lou

 

[Guest]

I learn by experimentation/disaster. I install/uninstall, tweak, etc.
I have used several Registry cleaners, such as jv16 ("last uncrippled free
version"), jv16 PowerTools 2005, EasyCleaner, and some I can't name now.
I learned from them, to use ERUNT.
I no longer use a registry cleaner. (Kept ERUNT, though.)
Milliseconds or even seconds of speed increase are not worth it to me.

 

[Bruce Chambers]

I hear all sorts of horrendous stories about the actions and potential
dangers of registry cleaners. I use Registry Mechanic and have found
it to be effective and reliable. I am told that it could create mayhem
on my HD.

Anyone any experience with this and other reg cleaners?

Lou.

What specific problem are you experiencing that you *know* beyond
all reasonable doubt will 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. Why use a shotgun 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 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 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.
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 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 shown me that such tools simply are not safe in the hands of the
inexperienced user.

The only thing needed to safely clean your registry is knowledge
and Regedit.exe. 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.

Further, no one has ever demonstrated, to my satisfaction, that the
use of an automated registry cleaner, particularly by an untrained,
inexperienced computer user, does any real good. 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.

I always use Regedit.exe. I trust my own experience and judgment
far more than I would any automated registry cleaner. I strongly
encourage others to acquire the knowledge, as well.



--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:



You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on having
both at once. - RAH

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Hi Lou ...

I'm surprised by the negative responses you received.

You wouldn't be, if you supported computers for a living.

Personally, I believe
the registry requires routine cleaning, especially when a system is treated
the way I do; i.e., lots & lots of program installs and uninstalls. You can
read another more credible man's (Fred Langa) opinions here:

You need to realize that Mr. Langa is a *journalist*, not a technician.
He doesn't support computers for a living. Instead, he's paid to
"review" products.





--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:



You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on having
both at once. - RAH

 

[Guest]

Hello, Subject not new, but deserves repeating.
1. Use JV16PowerTools (free version).
2. Use RegSeeker v1.45 (free vesion).
3. Have GoBack3 installed.
4. Have True Image backup on second drive. Updated weekly.
5. Have True Image clone on external drive. Thank You "Anna". Updated weekly.
6. Have erunt, do not use as GoBack3 is easier for me to use.
O.S. WindowsXP Home SP2, all security updates.
Use these utilities for the last 2 years, without known problems.
Install and remove programs weekly, some are small some are in the GB range.
I agree with most of the replies including, Crystal, Hoppy and Jim Byrd's I
found useful. Thank You.
If your unit is not critical in terms of need and you use some kind of
backup, then why not. Learning comes in all shades, positive and negitive.
Take Care.
beamish.