Do "Register Cleaners" really clean?

Some nasties will reside in your system restore try turning it off prior to cleaning

on your computer that are not needed, thus each time you use even your favorite sites, there will be the same things to remove. They are not necesarily bad, but they are not needed to remain. Some are poorly written and eventually clash with other equally poorly written ones and then cause problems.

The registry itelf is nothing more than a system scratchpad, keeping a record of what has gone on. Thus, repeated entries will re-appear since you will repeat many same functions day after day, such as MRU listing, etc. Plus, not all reported items are malware or malicous, they simply are in an area that could be used to start or gain info of your past actions, thus its wiping your tracks as insurace. So, you're always got something being reported. You can tweak your registry cleaner to "ignore" or "quarantine" once the action is safe to do so, thus tweak your results. Those are the common results, just beware of the abnormal or true attempts to infect your system. Also, with as many problems you seems to have, reduce those as "false postives" can result from reporting what other pgms. store info about and seen yet by another as the "signati\ure" they're looking but corrective action has already been done(safely stored/vaulted).

tada -----Willy

I also use Registry Mechanic and I have it set to run whenever I boot up my PC. As a matter of precaution, I also do a full scan before I shut down my PC, especially whenever I have been online for a significant length of time.

I also have SpyDoctor and they have done ok for me so far.

I would also recommend Privacy Guardian if you don't mind having to type in user names and passwords every time.

I always purge my tif files and cookies everyday and I have my history counter set to 0 days. Having seen what can happen to a PC when it gets infected I tend to err on the side of caution now. You can never be too careful.

If you will click on this link and scroll down to CCleaner, Marianna has a good post on it. It also makes a Backup, just in case anything goes wrong, You can restore it.
LINK
http://reviews.cnet.com/5208-6132-0.html?forumID=32&threadID=103759&messageID=1195330&tag=cnr

Larry

This may be a better link.

http://reviews.cnet.com/5208-6132-0.html?forumID=32&threadID=103390&messageID=1184733&tag=

Larry

I had a very hard time cleaning my registry of all kind of malware and popups until I found two programs that REALLY work: SpyFerret and StopZilla. Both combined with Hijack This and Google popup blocker did the trick. I never saw any popup or malware again. These two programs works in the background, don't take much space in your C: Drive. The only downfall is: Free version only works partially so to get rid of everything they found in your system you have to buy them, but it worth it, believe me!! My OS is Windows XP Pro SP2 Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.60 GHz, 504 MB of RAM.

We've heard it a million times in these forums, "If it's not broke, don't fix it."
Unfortunately I didn't heed these words.
I trialed Reg. mechanic before buying it and thought it was doing a good job. Ran it weekly without any problems for about 6 weeks, and then, big problems. Considering that my system had been running very smoothly for about 9 months prior to this, I can only think that registry mechanic has deleted something/s that it shouldn't have.
Sure, it asks what you want to delete after scanning, but I expect the program to know better than I what can/can't be safetly deleted.
9 months ago on my old machine, I used to run Norton utilities and it really created more problems than it fixed.

Hi,
Has anyone had experience with the above software?
I purchased it and find it very good, using it after each session online. http://www.registryfix.com
My system if made up of the following:
Pentium 4 ASUS
Intel P4 3.0 GHZ Prescott 1MB CPU Socket 478
ASUS P4S800-MX Motherboard onboard VGA + Audio + Nic
RAM 512MB DDR400 Legend CL2 CL2.5 CL3
Evercase ATX Beige /Silver 300Watt PS Case Prescott
Western Digital 80 GB 7200RPM 8MB cache Hard Disk Drive
Sony 3.5' floppy Disk
Mitzubishi DV171 JB 171JB 17inch 16MS Beige LCD with speakers
Microsoft Windows XP Home OEM
Liteon DVD+/-R/RW 16X Burner dual layer
Netcomm external 56K Roadster V.92 Modem
Evercase 120MM case Fan Ball bearing
MS Works Suite 2005 OEM
Cannon IP 1500AU Colour Printer cable included
I am not experienced so would invite comments regarding the above program. I also use MSN Giant Antispyware and Counterspy along with AVG 7.0. I have had not problems at all with viruses or spyware since using all the above software.
Tallin

Hi Vince, and my experience with computers and personally testing programs on my own to see how they work has lead to carnage at times, but I work it out and have recommended many things to my fellow workers and friends in order for them to avoid all the rogue programs out there also. Anyhow for Registry Mechanic, I use thatprogram also and really like the way it sorts out bad DLL'S as well as left over reg keys from a poor uninstall which happens all the time, for me it is one of the best all around cleaners and yes it does get rid of junk in your registry,but not 100%like alot of programs. I go right into the registry myself and just for curiosity see whats left from a scan and delete it manually. I also use Hijack this and have yet to come across anything yet that details possible hijacks or BHO'S and other startup malware like that program. I am currently running the guantlet testing diff spyware programs.

I purchased Registry First Aid because of problems with my registry. Specifically there are multiple entries in Windows 98 startup that shouldn't be there because the programs were deleted. After many trials just trying to get Registry First Aid installed I finally got it to work. Upon checking my startup three entries that should have been removed are still there. And they're still there after the weekly run of Registry First Aid.

Apparently the only way to clean up the registry is by personally going through REGEDIT.

My reply to these questions is a resounding "Yes". I use Registry Mechanic twice a week, sometimes more. If you are a real newbie you may find the results a bit daunting at first and wonder what to do with all the results. You will be quite safe if you use the Options and make sure RM sets a Restore Point, which it will do before you remove anything at all, so you can always go back and replace whatever you might need, and that is pretty unlikely. I just don't understand why you are running so many similar programmes which probably interfere with each other and could be the reason why you keep getting the same problems back over and over.
Good luck,
Chrissy