In the HKEY_CURRENT_USER...ZoneMap/Domains it seems like every domain on the internet is stored in this key. Is this something that is necessary? The reason I ask is there are large number of entries that seems kind of dicey with a lot of foreign domains mixed in as well.
Personally, I'd be happy to blast the entire Domain entry but I won't until I have a 100% understanding as to what it is.
How safe is it to remove selected entries?
Thanks,
Burt
HKEY_CURRENT_USER is for the logged-on user and someone likely visited all of those sites.
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE would effect all users.
Download and install CCleaner from the link in my sig. Use it to run the Registry scanner, and remove what it finds. Check if that removed the problem entries.
I run CCleaner daily. It has not touched any of these domains.
OK, do you have the dotted items in the snip below checked and run this part before the reg clean?
The index.dat files are removed at the next boot.
Yes, all of those are checked. I also run my computer as admin, always have, always will, so there are no permission problems that I know of. I also do not use IE. I may have booted it twice since using this particular computer but never did anything with it other then to check the viability of NBC.com when I couldn't reach a few particular videos they claimed to have (they didn't).
Very odd, I just searched my registry for ZoneMap and found a dozen or so entries but none had any domains or URLs in them.
Is this the computer in your specs and did you get a valid Windows 7 install DVD from a trusted source?
My Win7 is legit, purchased from Amazon and authorized by MS. To be more specific, I do not have URLs in my ZoneMap/Domains, just the folder entries. However, there are thousands of entries.
Ok had to rule out that you may have got one of many counterfeit copies that are around.
Can you post a screenshot of part regedit that shows these? If it shows a path, such as, C:\user\documents\mydocs\folder name, open one to see what it contains.
I'm still leaning toward they are some temp files from browsing. Do you use a browser other than IE? If so CCleaner may not clean them but you would have a browser setting for the temp files, at least Firefox does.
Essentially, this is a post by the super paranoid. I want my computer to have a completely sterile appearance. I don't use torrents, don't download anything that has a suggestions of taint, I don't visit dicey sites. I also have a lot of paid-for expensive software all with registered and certified serial numbers.
I do not like the fact that I have these nasty folders in my registry and therefore, would like to get rid of them. As the registry seems to collect any url it can get its greedy paws on I'll probably switch to VirtualBox running LInux to use as my browser OS. No nasty surprises there.
In the meantime, I'd still like to clean up the registry. I'm aware that the folders are simple place holders. BTW, they all contain a single entry:
(Default) REG_DWORD 0x00000005 (5) //not sure if I typed the correct number of 0
Any thoughts?
Thanks,
Burt
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