Do I Need a Registry Cleaner?

Hi Bob --- what about Vista??? Registry cleaner needed... if so, which recommended?

EDITOR'S NOTE: I don't think the registry is changed (structurally) in Vista. RegSeeker and CCleaner both say they work with Vista.

As a long-time Tourbus rider (more than 10 years) I've come to trust your advice. So I installed and used RegSeeker to clean my registry. I figured I know enough about the registry (I've done hacks). RegSeeker came back with more than 700 registry entries to be deleted, and I checked 3-4 to verify that they were legit. I had it delete everything it listed, but immediately found my default settings messed up, and Adobe very upset about not being able to access one of its keys.

So I went to restore the backup I had (of course!) made, and discovered (1) there is no obvious way to do a restore, and (2) there is no Help in RegSeeker. Rooting around online, I found this entry from a moderator in the Piriform forum:

Andavari: is there a particular reason you stopped using RegSeeker?

Yes. I have better things to do than track down every so-called "invalid" reference it finds which has turned into a very unappealing chore, especially when much of the stuff found wasn't even invalid to begin with so it was a waste of time, thus the bore compliment I made several posts up from this one. ...
Although it seems the customized exclude.ini file is a tidbit more popular than I could have imagined as a Google search turned up multiple pages it's mentioned in, and one person surprisingly stated it made RegSeeker 10x safer to use, wow. Anyways I just hope the developer of the program takes charge in making it even at least 20x safer because with the default exclude.ini it's dangerous especially if people delete everything it lists. (http://forum.piriform.com/index.php?showtopic=7196)

I'm afraid this has undermined my trust in the Tourbus - wish you guys would do a little background work before recommending software!

EDITOR'S NOTE: RegSeeker does make backups of deleted registry entries, if you select the "Backup before deletion" checkbox. I just downloaded a fresh copy, and the box is checked by default. Just double-click on a .REG file in Windows Explorer and it will undo the action.

You can also undo everything with a System Restore. But I thank you for the research into potential RegSeeker problems. I will update the article with your findings.

I've used many registry cleaners. RegCure seems to be one of the best, but last week I found the best and it's free Ccleaner. So far, I've had enough confidence (or stupidity) to just let it do it's thing. It cleans out all the junk files as well as the registry. Using any of the others, my computer has always gained a little speed, but since using Ccleaner, it is running just as fast as when it was new.

Bob: I too have used TOURBUS for over 10 years and tend to see you guys as 'the bible' on computer stuff...imagine my disappointment upon trying to accept your recommendation of CCleaner. You failed to mention that u cannot install this software without also accepting Yahoo Toolbar along with it. While I realize the makers of CCleaner have to live and eat, I wasn't happy with being forced to accept another thing I definitely DON'T want, so I didn't accept/install CCleaner and am back at square one looking for a free, well constructed, user friendly registry cleaner.

EDITOR'S NOTE: Butch, the Yahoo Toolbar is OPTIONAL when you install CCleaner. I noted in the license agreement that it is specified as an optional component, but even if you missed that, the next screen gives you a list of items to check/uncheck for the install. Uncheck the Yahoo Toolbar, and you have CCleaner free and clear.

There is NO evidence that using a registry cleaner does anything to improve performance. The ONLY place you will find this type of "evidence" is on web sites that are trying to get you to buy their product. The PC does NOT get slow due to the registry getting larger, or because there are keys present that are no longer used. Any technician worth their salt, will NOT recommend the use of a registry cleaner and will sway people away from them. This is a good read on the dangers of using one: http://www.edbott.com/weblog/?p=643

EDITOR'S NOTE: As my science teacher used to say, the proof is in the pudding, or rather the eating thereof. I've experienced significant startup and performance gains after registry cleaning, and quite a few people have written to me saying the same thing. It makes sense... if your registry is telling Windows to load a file, and it has to search various paths to find that it doesn't exist, you will see a slowdown. Even Ed Bott (who I've always respected) is not quite so down on registry cleaners. In the article you reference, he includes a quote from George Ou who says that CCleaner "does make the system a little more responsive. You don’t get as many unexplained pauses."

Please note that the quote from George Ou on CCleaner is NOT about using the Registry Cleaning portion. I think it would be impossible to run a Registry Cleaner and remove 1 GB of junk. You have taken the quote out of context to support running a cleaner. Not completely kosher!

EDITOR'S NOTE: I don't want to have a public argument with you, but does it seem reasonable that George Ou would run CCleaner and NOT use the registry cleaner that's built in to it? I don't think so. The bottom line is this: many people DO benefit by running a registry cleaner. And for the record, I don't make a penny if people download RegSeeker or CCleaner. I just recommend them because I and many others have found them beneficial.

The only point that I am trying to impress is that these programs are dangerous and should not be generally recommended, without HUGE caveats. General maintenance such as deleting temp files, running a scandisk and defrag will work on all machines with no ill effects. This is not true with a registry cleaner. Just a last final word from Mark Russinovich.
http://www.whatthetech.com/2007/11/25/do-i-need-a-registry-cleaner/

EDITOR'S NOTE: Interestingly, the website above is an article from November 2007 which quotes Mark Russinovich and his opinion on registry cleaners. But Blair, the author of that post, wrote a followup a month later which was a GLOWING review of Uniblue Registry Booster, showing that it reduces both bootup time and app launch time. Of further interest, the Uniblue website shows that Uniblue is a Microsoft Gold Certified Partner.

So yes, point taken. I will add some additional caveats to my writeup on registry cleaners. But it seems undeniable that they can be a significant help.

One last try. The author in that link, was in fact Blair, BUT the entire post is a quote from Bill Castner who in turn quotes Mark Russinovich for most of his points. So, Blair can review and rave about Uniblue's product, but I think I will place substantially more faith in Mr Castner and Russinovich who have more credentials that whoever this Blair is.

Secondly,note that when he ran Registry Booster, he ALSO ran the defrag option. There is no question that running a defrag application on the registry will result in performance gains, particularly at boot time. But, he did not do any performance testing after just doing the cleaning option. Thus, using the test to validate speedup claims as a result of cleaning the registry is not valid.

I have no qualms in recommending in running a Defrag/Compaction app periodically, but I have still seen no evidence that Registry Cleaners are 100% safe and foolproof, or do anything productive for the majority of PC users.

You should see how adamantly the anti-cleaner group speaks against registry cleaners; or perhaps you've already seen this for yourself. That always makes me curious: just what is so delicate on their systems that is so imperilled by registry cleaners?

I've set up hundreds of XPs, and I also work with Vista and, some years ago, Windows ME. My systems are often elaborately customized, so that they are very pretty for the user (needlessly, but nice) and are based on some fairly complex modifications.

And yet, you would laugh (or recoil in horror) at my use of RegSeeker. I use it on Auto, with either 2 or 4 scans, no registry backups. In other words, I say, "Go to it." That is the least cautious way the thing can be used.

Does it wreck my systems? Nope. Yet these are complex systems, often using, say, 300 small and large apps. Shouldn't things fall apart? Well, I feel it depends on the way things are set up. It must, because so many people report registry cleaners causing them all sorts of problems.

On a typical run on a "good" system, I expect RegSeeker to find about a dozen things it doesn't like. On a clogged system that is running very slowly, I've seen RegSeeker identify over 3,000 problems--which (gasp!) I've let it simply delete. If it is a client's computer, I let it do the backups, which I delete after I'm satisfied all is well.

I'm not suggesting anyone follow my reckless technique. But I am saying that I sure have to wonder about people who seem to run into trouble SO easily.

One comment about CCleaner. I use it and I like it, but I uncheck the Microsoft Office squares. MS Office has a peculiarity, in which, if you change some seemingly trivial registry settings that should cause no damage it all, Office will reset a lot of its tweaked settings to Default. I think it is intended as a protective measure. CCleaner showed up as an extremely suspicious (but unproven) cause for (especially) Word 2000 to revert to its defaults.

Thanks for the article, Bob. (And, for anyone who disagrees wholesale with my take on cleaners, I'd suggest TuneUp Utilities 2008 with its 1-Click Maintenance might be more to your liking. That's a very nice program, too. 30-day trialware; worth the $50 or so pricetag after a month.)

I'm very fond of jv16 PowerTools 2008. Fred Langa, two or three years ago, rated the then current version as the best of the bunch; some older techies may remember RegCleaner, which was the first product by the same author. I can't agree with the "cleaners aren't necessary" comments above: they shouldn't be necessary, I agree, but not all software uninstalls cleanly, not everyone's PC runs clean all the time, and not everyone is able to avoid the sort of problems that a good registry cleaner can clean up after. (Maybe if we all used only Microsoft software, made restore points before doing anything new and only used our computers for writing letters, he might have a better point, but I've been managing PCs since the mid-1980s and I don't use or recommend things that don't do anything useful! Often... ;) )