Posted by Charles_Ca on 6/1/09 2:13pm
Msg #290675

Question for PAW on reg cleaners

I started using Ccleaner several years ago and then actually bought RegCure when I kept having problems with my Sony Vaio. I recently was looking at different products and ran into a lot of conflicting opinions regarding registry values. Now I have both Ccleaner and Regcure on my current machine and when I run the scan they both pick up what appear to be different problems. It doesn't matter whether I run Ccleaner first or RegCure I wind up with a different set of values even after running the fix. I seriously doubt that I can generate up to 350 registry errors if I run the one program right after the other. Are some of the errors fictitious to make the product look good? It seems also that RegCure seems to find consistently more problems than Ccleaner. The one thing I do know is that my computer boots faster and seems to respond better after running either one (or is it just my wishful thinking).

Reply by PAW on 6/1/09 5:37pm
Msg #290719

In my opinion, the registry cleaners are hit-n-miss. They all do some housekeeping, but I really don't have any personal experience with any that works all that great. What you are seeing is what I have seen in the past too. They all have their strong points and weaknesses. Further, what one flags as an 'error' may not be an error in reality, but needs investigation.

I haven't kept up with all the registry changes since NT first came out. (Since I wasn't in IT any longer, there wasn't any real driving force for me to keep abreast of the nitty-gritty.)

CCleaner has received good marks from different 'rating' places, such as PC Mag, and C-net. I've never looked for anything about RegCure.

No matter which one to use, or both, it should clean up some things. But, there is an inherent danger with any registry cleaner. When it 'fixes' one thing, it may break another. It's always a crap shoot. Whatever you do, make sure you back up the registry in its entirety before doing anything. (RegEdit and RegEdit32 will do a full backup.) There's an old saying from the old days that still applies, maybe even more so today - Backup before you Hackup.

Reply by Glenn Strickler on 6/1/09 6:07pm
Msg #290728

My 2 cents worth

Try this link using IE:

http://onecare.live.com/site/en-US/default.htm?s_cid=sah

This is a Microsoft site and it's free ...

If you have Vista, you must do a full scan .. viruses, spyware, registry errors and disk cleanup.

With xp you could just scan the registry or just choose one feature.

I have found it works well, IMHO.

Cheers ...

Reply by Charles_Ca on 6/1/09 9:21pm
Msg #290744

Thank you Gentlemen! I appreciate the responses. n/m

Reply by Gary_CA on 6/2/09 10:33am
Msg #290792

Back in the old days

Norton Utilities had Win Doctor in it that was supercalifragilistic expialidocious. I don't know if they still do but Norton went to hell in general when they introduced "Norton Internet Security" evil evil program that very effectively any cross contamination on your network, including between your PC and your printer... by not allowing any data to move on your network, not even to your printer.

Evil.

Back in the really old days Mace Utilities performed miracles in DOS but now I'm just being nostalgic.