What is a good, reliable registry cleaner?

[severedsolo]

+1 99% of all computer problems are caused by the USER

 

[kucing13]

and 1% ?

 

[osholt]

and 1% ?

Hardware/other.

Oli

 

[Jonathan_King]

and 1% ?

Hardware/other.

Oli

Hmm...can't backup that statistic either. Take a look in the Crashes section and see how many BSODs are caused by the user.

 

[kucing13]

thats why i thought of creating section for BSOD only... most of the probs in the forum about BSOD

 

[si8mon]

I use CCleaner for cleaning up my computer but i don't use their registry cleaner much.

The only time I feel I need to clean up the windows 7 registry is after uninstalling a program (i uninstall and install a lot of programs on my comp) and for that task i use Revo Uninstaller. Revo uninstalls any program on your computer (using the program's uninstaller) and thens scans your Registry for leftovers of that program.

Other then that, the Windows 7 registry handles itself quite well and registry programs will do more harm then good to your computer.

 

[CarlTR6]

I have a few registry cleaners that I have found safe for MY system, but that said, many of the registry cleaners are far too aggressive, and WILL bork your system if you don't know what it is they want to remove. The only registry cleaner I recommend universally is CCleaner. It may not be as thorough, but it is the only program I know of that has caused no problems for anyone I know or have run across.

Using a good uninstaller program (I use Your Uninstaller myself) such as Revo Uninstaller will remove most of the leftover registry entries. CCleaner for the "safest" registry cleaner. A Guy

P.S. ERUNT and NTREGOPT both work fine with Windows 7 if you set a scheduled task for ERUNT, or use this batch file:

PDQ Library: Backup/restore Windows 7 registry using ERUNT

Description of ERUNT

When the Windows registry gets corrupted, it can mess up your entire system. Emergency Recovery Utility NT--but you can call it ERUNT--lets you back up your registry. With ERUNT's restore folders, you can restore your NT-based system to its full glory. And if your PC's sorry state has reduced you to a mess, too, don't worry; ERUNT doesn't have any complicated settings. You can set ERUNT to automatically backup and restore the folders, too.

Have you ever seen the registry get corrupted and bring down a system, other than malware? Neither have I.

The only time I see registry related problems is when someone has run a registry cleaner or optimizer on it.

Exactly! Well said.

 

[kucing13]

in short for REG CLEANER. "don't use it if you think you don't have to"

 

[gregrocker]

Again, CCleaner Registry tab will not mess up your Registry or computer in any way. It is not in the same class as Registry Cleaners which are mostly a sales operation and not a finely tuned, state-of-the-art cleaner which has achieved a peak of perfection.

After Revo'ing all the bloatware on a factory install, CCleaner will often find 200+ inactive registry keys to remove which Revo has left behind.

The next step for CCleaner is to replace msconfig with more user-friendly Startup item descriptions than it now has, similar to Windows Defender's Software Explorer which is disabled by install of the new free AV leader, MS Security Essentials.

 

[Jonathan_King]

Hate to contradict you Greg, but I messed up the family computer pretty good using CCleaner registry cleaner.

I guess it could also have been Revo. I was cleaning up that day. Long story short, I did a clean install a bit later to fix it.

 

[gregrocker]

Why blame CCleaner if it could have been Revo, which is much more likely?

CCleaner will not touch an active Reg key while Revo lets you choose from a list but only the bolded items are safe.

Revo does set a restore point you can use to recover if necessary.

The problem with Revo is that it is easy to select a Registry Item that isn't in bold. Better to use Moderate than Pro unless you are really viglant as it uses a Safe Mode that makes this harder.

 

[Jonathan_King]

Well I didn't do a controlled test, but you can see why I'm not comfortable with those reg programs anymore!

 

[gregrocker]

There is good reason not to be, because a lot of the Registry Cleaner popup ads are malware or a sales operation with nothing good to back it up.

These give a bad name to the one flawless free Cleaner backed by ingenious innovation and fine-tuning.

 

[whopperbk]

Is this Ccleaner good?

 

[si8mon]

Is this Ccleaner good?

Its a great piece of software. Everyone on this forum will recommend it to you.

 

[electrotune1200]

The best registry cleaner....

A clean installation of Windows.

 

[osholt]

Unnecessary registry cleaning results in many problems further down the line.

Oli

 

[Jonathan_King]

Here is the question: why do people think they need to clean out the registry? It's not like the hard disk. The programs know exactly where to look for the reg entries they need, and don't need to go searching.

As for hard drive space taken, the whole registry takes about a quarter GB, less than 500MB at worst.

 

[si8mon]

The best registry cleaner....

A clean installation of Windows.

+1

 

[flez]

I give a thumbs up for CC, never ever done my systems anyharm, and as to the óver cleaning'the registry statement, please.....

It removes inactive entries, thats all, once its removed them, you can run it again and again its not going to remove anymore or anything else!

Dont put all registry cleaners in the same basket, crapcleaner is the only one i would ever use or recommend, I do try others on test systems, but have not needed to change yet and have been using CC for 3 years on many systems.

Just moved also to auslogics disk defrag, run it a dozen times last night on a win7 laptop to see what would happen, end result, no data loss, no damage, slightly faster laptop.