What Is Registry Cleaner?
The Windows Registry is one of the most important parts of any Microsoft Windows operating system. As such, it's also important to properly maintain it for the good health of your computer. The easiest way to go about cleaning your registry is by downloading and installing a registry cleaner. Microsoft Windows does not provide a registry cleaner of its own, so you must download a third-party application (see link in Resources).
Other People Are Reading
-
Definition
-
A Registry Cleaner is a program that scours the Windows Registry and looks for problems with parts of it. Instead of having a user go through the entire system's registry and trying to guess which registry values can go, which can't, and which are necessary to the system, the cleaner automatically goes in and figures out what registry values should stay, and what should go.
Purpose
-
The Windows Registry serves as a depository for certain information, such as user profiles and a number of tries someone has attempted a task, or even the number of errors that occur in a program. As time passes, software gets upgraded or removed using the uninstallation program typically included with the software. However, the uninstallation software can forget to take the information in the Windows registry with it. This means that the information takes up space in the registry and ultimately slows it down.
-
Method
-
Most Registry Cleaners usually initiate a full system scan when used. They scan the entire registry and link them to the programs that they are connected to. If the cleaner doesn't find a program that's linked to the registry values, it flags the values for deletion. Additionally, the cleaner will also flag registry sections that have no values in them, or duplicate files inside.
Usage
-
The amount of times you should use a registry cleaner depends on a number of issues: First, how much software do you install on a regular basis? Second, how often do you use the software? Third, how much software do you uninstall, and how often do you do it? The general rule is that the more often you do these things, the more often you should have your registry cleaned.
Problems
-
It is important before doing any sort of work with the registry to back it up. This is because one of the biggest problems registry cleaners have is the tendency to accidentally delete registry values that are being in use. This could have a number of consequences, from a program losing data, to not being able to run, to a complete and total crippling of the PC.
-
