PC utilities forum: PC system cleaners: Who's doing a better job of cleaning?

I use PitStop Optimize 3 in Windows 7 and it seems to do the job/

I was told that running too many utilities causes conflicts and eventually kills your hard drive. This was told to me by a IT person.

I don't see the 'hard drive' being ruined, but consider this.

Use Registry Cleaner "A" to make changes to the registry. Then use Registry Cleaner "B" to scan the registry. Who is to say it will either, 'find different' problems' or find problems that Registry Cleaner "A" made, and try to fix them.

Now add another one, Registry Cleaner "C" into the mix.

You can see that running all of these and more might eventually so mess up the registry that the poor OS no longer knows what is right or wrong.

My solution? Don't use any!

Mark

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Hi



Having used a number of system cleaners over the years it is
difficult to say which is the best or which one does a better job. I stopped using AdAware a number of years a
go because it was crashing and locking my system and insisted in taking control.
As a rule I do not like anything that does not allow you full control over when
it runs especially as running such utilities at the same time can cause damage.
As a rule ANY SOFTWARE which claims or suggest it is free and is able to find
and resolve your issues should be taken with a pinch of salt but when it then
says it has found a number of issue which it can fix but you then have to pay
either by signing up for something or for a fee should not be used. There is no
guarantee that they can do or fix what's wrong, they can cause even more
problems and can come with even more issues such as adware, virus's, trogens,
high jacks and change setting which you neither wanted or intended. As a
general rule if you come a cross a utility that you want to use and I would try
to use one that has been recommended, always go direct to the source if
possible or to a site that you know to be safe and never via an advert, not all
are, as they seem.



I have used and do use a number of system utilities, some
are free and have an upgrade (e.g. Pro, full services) for a fee and some you
have to pay for. I currently use Spybot (***** free/donation), System Mechanic (***** Fee with upto 3 PC's,
there is a Pro version) and Ccleaner
(**** free/fee for upgrade).



Because prevention is ALWAYS better than cure, I would
recommend that you make a list of Utility functions that you might need (e.g.
data recovery, Reg cleaner, hard disk check/repair, etc.), then look on line
for recommendation (Cnet is a good start), once you have made your choice
install and if possible make an emergency recovery disk for when thing go bad.

And never run more than one at a time.

I have run CCleaner-Glarys Pro & Win utilities for appx. 4 years on my Vistas OS without crashing or burning a drive, not at the same time { of COURSE }.I use Glarys Pro to clean my Reg. this is the only 1 of the 3 that always lets me choose whether to delete or not.Ccleaner gets rid of browser history etc. best & Win defrags & cleans free space best.

the differences between cleaners is a s varied as the cleaners them selves.
CCleaner lends allot of its power to privacy, Glary Utilities leans towards the registry as a whole allowing it to "optimize" your system, while ASC-4 is a system cleaner not just the registry, but duplicate files and the like.
Another reason they differ is the settings values, A medium or thorough setting in one could equal a minimal setting in another. As with any system maintenance a restore point or system backup should be done first.
another program that i've had great success with is Juoini Vuorno's Regcleaner and JV16 power tools from Macecraft.
I hope this helps and remember its always personal preference in picking your software, Ya gotta be comfortable right?

"CCleaner" by Piriform (www.piriform.com) is not an anti-virus utility!!! It doesn't have a 'scan for spyware/adware' option (or functionality)!

If you are getting anti-virus messages (or any other messages about spyware, adware, trojans, worms, etc) then you are not running a legitimate version of CCleaner ... period!

I seriously suspect your PC has been corrupted by a 'scare ware' virus/adware (pretending to be CCleaner). And, by letting it run (over & over?) you are probably exposing yourself (and all you e-mail contacts) to spammers, hackers, keyloggers/identity thief attempts, etc.

I've been running the free version of CCleaner 5+ years (thru multiple versions/upgrades) without it doing anything like what say is happening to your PC. As with all "clean-up" tools, you can screw-up your system by deleting things you should not so you should not "just let it run" without checking the results and knowing what it will delete, etc ... for that matter you shouldn't let any anti-virus, anti-adware/spyware, registry cleaner, or disk cleaner run unless you know it is a very well trusted product and that you obtained it from a very trusted, respectable source. You should always review and be careful (ie: have backups) should you decide to let any utility delete registry entries, disk files, etc.

Do yourself (and your friends) a favor: PLEASE run a known valid, brand name, up-to-date anti-virus tool that you obtain from a known valid vendors website (ie: Norton, McAfee, Avast, AVG, etc) ASAP to verify your system is clean!

And, NEVER, NEVER run software that just 'shows up' and says it will save you from all the evils of the world!

GoodTimeCharlie and webserf have pretty much said it all. One good antivirus + a good 'cleanup' after surfing will keepyou out of trouble. I've used Trend-Micro (formally PC-Cillin) for over 15 years...never had anything bad touch my system. Present program is TM's Titanium Internet Security Suite. It's reliable, not heavy on the system, and has wonderful support! In fact, it tells me where the dangerous pages are. CCleaner is used every time I finish on the web. I would humbly suggest that one find a good cleaner that correlates to one's system and stick with it until you find something better. I sincerely believe that a lot of folks have too much 'stuff' installed that they rely on and it sometimes bottle-necks the system. Lastly, try to stick with the 'KISS' principle.

I would say that, with reference to the above, both Avast and CCleaner are excellent utillitys. However Spybot is getting a little long in the tooth, and tends to miss quite a lot. Download Super anit spyware (sounds like spyware itself lol), and see the difference in what it manages to rake up!

Just like "arrowsmith", I use Avast, CCleaner, Wise's Registry & Disk Cleaners, plus, when I'm feeling the need to go deeper, I run my WinUtilities suite (the free version). Yes, it all seems like a bit of a pain, but when dealing with this stuff it really is a case of "better safe than sorry". The above combo of tools hasn't given me any problems in over 2 years and solved/stopped quite a few before they got out of hand.

If you have Malwarebytes for the tough junk, (weekly) C Cleaner for the crapola (daily) and Advanced System Care (regularly) you will do fine. Anytime something comes up that states that you MUST clean your system now... it's gonna crash etc, virus will spread, on and on... just reboot and run Malwarebytes. It will find that stuff and Quarrantine it, and it's a very easy delete process. One other little trick.... if you press down on the Control and Shift buttons... then tap the Delete, you can delete all your browsing history. Neat. I love Comodo Firewall too. I always download Avast ...for any newbie and remove almost any program that is there, as there is no Update process involved and that's pretty nice to K.I.S.S. In TOOLS, go to Advanced and remove the check marks on Animation and also Sounds in Webpages, as they slow down the process. While you're there, do check Do not save encrypted pages to Disk... and Delete temporary files upon closing the browser. Hey, every little bit helps. If you actually require those you can simply uncheck them.

I agree with your post, and the key words in it were in regard to clicking on rogue pop-ups. This has been the downfall of most unsuspecting users.
Many of these rogue thieves are imitating themselves as known legitimate software and getting away with it.

A recent customer of mine was all but shut down by what I call Extortion-Ware. "Your Computer Is Broken. PAY Us And It Will Be "Fixed"". "I thought it was my malware program", she said. People just don't know what to do, and are desperate to get their computers working again, and will pay, many times.

These thieves should be investigated, and put in jail. They must have connections to banks in order to collect the money through credit card transaction to "clean" the computer, so it shouldn't be hard to track them down.

This isn't something I'd EVER recommend to someone I don't know personally, but believe it or not, over the last several years I've run a couple of my own PCs (which nobody else ever touched) with no AV/AM memory-resident! I like to squeeze every possible ounce of performance out of my system, and even when I buy a new computer it's far from top-of-the-line.

Once WinXP SP2 came out, with a good built-in firewall, and I was confident that I knew which banners not to click on or emails to open -- neither of which is all that difficult after you've spent more than a half dozen years online, and paid attention to things -- I got comfortable with just running 1-2 free AV program scans and 1-2 free AM scans every couple weeks. More recently, I've seen and heard about more sophisticated bad stuff, so I keep Avast and SuperAntiSpyware going at all times. . .both have great reputations and don't eat up a lot of my precious resources. But for the better part of a decade, I managed to keep 2 or 3 of my PCs free of evil just by being smart and practicing (what I think is) common sense. I'm still using XP (SP3...er, more or less 4, i guess), but I can't wait to move up to Win7 and multiple cores!

Did you get one of those pop-ups that only appears to be scanning your system and then tries to sell you the cure?

Download Avast from Cnet downloads-Set it on High & set boot time scan then reboot { restart } if u have a virus it will find & eliminate it.