Just be mindful that a registry cleaner will only remedy missing/faulty registry keys. Fixing the registry in isolation gives no guarantee it’ll resolve all issues as there may be problems due to missing/faulty drivers or files. You could try Reimage which takes the bigger picture, fixing malfunctions across the full Windows system. At the very least, you could try its free scan to diagnose if it’s the registry and/or faulty files that are causing the issue then chose for yourself how to fix it (by yourself or using Reimage). I’ve been using it on 3 PCs for over a year now with great success, so wrote my own review of reimage for pc maintenance.

Why am I getting the January 9th page?

Had to reinstall, bit activation key not valid any more. has anyone got the registration key?

Thanks in advance

The main thing newbies need to learn is that NONE of these "registry helpers" do much good. They may or may not cause problems, but they won't straighten out a mess made by installing/uninstalling tons of junkware.

-Larry

After reading all 70 plus reviews I could not help but submit my comments again.

Like most everyone else I have tried registry cleaners, et al, and have had good and bad experiences. I use XPPro & XPHome plus SP3 and all updates have been installed on my PCs/notebook. Software I had tried to speed up my units where were then low on RAM include some of those mentioned here: Advance WindowsCare, Glary Utilities, NCleaners, etc. The one practice I have learned is to create a system restore point before using any of these cleaners.

I now have Tune Up Utilities, CCleaner, ATF Cleaner, Registry Booster, Win Utilities, ARDPro and all work fine without any conflict. I used to just download, install, activate and run cleaners. After having learned my lesson on use of cleaners, I made it a point to do some Windows basics like Disk Cleanup, Disk Check, Defragmentation, on line-security updates, etc. I followed all the recommendations in speeding up PCs from an on-line article, "Speed Up Your PC," that I read.

Based on the free servicing I do around my neighborhood I noticed that not everyone running XP SP3 does the basics and here's where the problem lies. When cleaners, et al are installed and used crashes or conflicts occur. I believe one basic in using cleaners is the user has to understand what it does before using it.

All the PCs and notebooks I now have at home work like brand new. [An IBM NetVista desktop came back to life after I used ARDPro [thanks to GAOTD] and had since maintained this unit using such.] The three PCs are six years old already while the notebook is only two years old.

Before shutting down any of the units at home I run the following in order since not all cleaners remove all types of trash: 1) ATF Cleaner, 2) CCleaner and 3) Tune Up Utilities One Click Maintenance. The next time I boot up my PCs/notebook are as good as new. I hope you will find this useful.

Haven't tried this on Vista HP. So far everyone of these
has knocked out my DVD and usually mobo sound.
With a C: and D: both large SATA 3 drives the DVD is E: on
slot 4 of the 4 SATA slots.
So far only cure is to leave PC power Unplug all 3 data straps.
Then stick DVD data plug back in FIRST. Then C: then D:
Now boot up and all three show they are detected. Prior bios
hands at the 2 HDs, then shows no detection DVD and Vista hangs
for 5 spinning logo. If go to bios, no DVD.
Tried Vista SP2 beta. No help. Have to do it that way. Vista will
also display some msg at desktop about having detected a device and
installed s/w for it. So the registry cleaners remove something.
g/l
(

Always create a restore point before using any type of registry cleaner/defragger or tune-up/optimize software.

For those mentioning that it looks like Premium Booster, here's why...

If you go to this site you'll see that Advanced Registry Doctor is a product from Elcor.

Programs developed by Elcor Software:
h ttp://software-informer.software.informer.com/

Premium Booster costs $26.95 and Advanced Registry Doctor goes for $24.95

It took out my MSSLLFile entry which was an new update to Internet Explorer....MSSLLFile\shell\open\command\: ""iexplore.exe" "%1""...This has to do with security.....VERY BAD

It removed the app path entry for for my Sound Blaster.mcl, although the path is correct and the file exists in that director.....BAD
It removed the App Paths the setup.exe and install.exe. These are the default values that are created on a Windows install.....lockOnTSNonInstallMode REG_DWORD 0x00000001(1) This can produce errors when you run programs with setup.exe or install.exe...VERY BAD

It removed the App Paths\table30.exe\UseShortName: "". No longer do my shortcuts have the name Advanced Registry Doctor - shortcut....This can only be done with a registry hack. Excellent. Didn't stay however

I did a search on my computer for msvcr71.dll and found about 10 files in different folders. As long as the file is the exact size in the windows\system32 directory, these can be safely deleted. I tested it by running each program after deleting the msvcr71.dll and they all worked fine.

So when it deleted these entries, it removed the entries in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SharedDLLs key.....VERY GOOD

It removed many CLSID\Typlib entries which were pointing to programs I had uninstalled....VERY GOOD

WARNING Do not delete any .dll file that exists in the C:\Windows\system32\SMINST or the C:\Windows\system32\winsxs directories.

Hi all!!

What can I say? This GAOTD is absolutely a keeper even though it's quite similar to its "twin" Premium Booster given here by GAOTD a few days ago.

And as proof of it it got a good rating on Softpedia (4 stars out of 5 given by 37 users is not bad at all for a Shareware, is it?).



FREE ALTERNATIVES:



- TUNE UP UTILITIES 2007

- ADVANCED SYSTEM CARE (formerly Advanced WindowsCare): very good!

- SWEEPI 5.4

- FREE WINDOW REGISTRY REPAIR 1.5 (very good)

- ASHAMPOO WINOPTIMIZER 4

- ARGENTE REGISTRY CLEANER 1.5.2.1 (EXCELLENT)

http://www.softpedia.com/get/Tweak/Registry-Tweak/Argente-Registry-Cleaner.shtml


- QUICKSYS REGDEFRAG 2.1 (VERYGOOD)

http://www.download.com/Quicksys-RegDefrag/3000-2094_4-10844188.html?tag=mncol

- GLARY UTILITIES FREE EDITION

- Glarysoft Registry Repair


Actually I was impressed by the last one which I discovered just a few days ago. It's an advanced registry cleaner for Windows with many extra features such as a short explanation of why each key is no longer necessary, an option to decide which programs launch on start-up and a feature to automatically back up the Registry before removing anything.

Amazingly when I used this program it has found more than 100 problems to the registry that Glary Utilites, Advanced Windows Care and the award-winning CCleaner did not detect.

Did I say that it's FREE?


http://www.download.com/Glary-Registry-Repair/3000-2086_4-10372101.html?tag=mncol;txt



For VISTA users I suggest also trying "DTweak Free", an advanced tweaker and optimizing tool designed to enhance the performance and the speed of your PC and its processes especially for PC running VISTA as OS.

You will be surpised at the speed your PC will be having after you use this little GEM.

With DTweak you can:

- defragment disks and registers,
- clean registry sistem,
- tune computer performance,
- optimize and increase the speed of your system without manually modifying registers or ini files.


h ttp://www.softpedia.com/get/Tweak/System-Tweak/DTweak-Free.shtml

h ttp://www.download.com/DTweak-Free/3000-2086_4-10800709.html

(remove space at beginning)


As you can see it got VERY GOOD RATING from users in both sites.


Having said, whatever registry cleaner you may ever use, that the best way to dramatically improve the performance and speed of your PC is just to DEFRAGMENT your HARD DRIVE at least once a month, with SMART DEFRAG 1.03 or AUSLOGICS DISK DEFRAG or JK DEFRAG, and then use this GAOTD or, in sequence, other FREE APPLICATIONS such as the following ones:

- REGSEEKER
- CLEAN MY REGISTRY
- REGSCRUB
- CCLEANER
- ADVANCED SYSTEM CARE (formerly Advanced WindowsCare)
- FREE WINDOW REGISTRY REPAIR 1.5
- NT REGISTRY OPTIMIZER, a registry compactor that improves system performance by removing any slack space that may be left from previously modified or deleted keys without changing the contents of the registry in any way.

Check out also the instructions of this two threads:


h ttp://users.telenet.be/bluepatchy/miekiemoes/slowcomputer.html

h ttp://www.speedupyourcomputer.windowsreinstall.com/index.htm

(remove space at beginning)


Finally don't forget that a great way to avoid the REGISTRY CLUTTER, using all the registry cleaner set out above, is simply to install a VIRTUAL OPERATING SYSTEM in your PC or better still a SANBOXIE PROGRAM such as RETURNIL, previously given by GAOTD, SANDBOXIE, GESWALL or SAFESPACE, because they allow your existing OS to become a Host into another Guest operating system or the applications you download to run in a special environment that does not mess up the REGISTRY of your existing OS.

Since users can switch between the two OS or the OS and the SANDBOXIE LAYER any time they want to, the VIRTUAL OPERATING SYSTEM and SANDBOXIE PROGRAMS are also a great way to make Windows systems impervious to virus attack and spyware being capable to automatically sanitize all web activities and surfing history without any hassle.

In other words with VIRTUAL OS and SANDBOXIE PROGRAMS you can say farewall to the REGISTRY CLUTTER and, as consequence of this, to the tons of REGISTRY CLEANERS such as this GAOTD that almost everybody has installed in their PC...LOL!!

Hope all of this can help!!


Cheers from Italy!

Giovanni

Dang, you guys that now have damaged and, or unbootable computers after using this give away. I really do feel badly for you. I sure hope you get them fixed & I won't say others warned you. It would be mean & rude of me. I don't bash Vista or any other system someone else uses & I don't think this kind of problem is funny at all. I've been there way to many times & had to reformat.
I'm just happy I passed on this offer. I mainly did because of past, bad experiences with registry cleaners. To those thinking that a safe registry cleaning on occasion doesn't help, WRONG! All windows based computers get bogged down from left over trash. If you have the smarts and some level of experience with Windows, you will use any one with caution & be sure to have a backup ready first! Blind faith & and or over cleaning is like trying to cross a 6 lane freeway in rush hour traffic, blindfolded. You will get hit!

I just wanted to make a personal comment here to thank all that
make reply posts. It saves me a lot of time and grief when I
can see results others are having.

Plus, there's the added benefit of great suggestions for free
programs similar to what is being offered.

Thanks guys and gals. Have a great, prosperous New Year!!!

May I add my 2 pence on registry cleaning ? There are without doubt problems caused when using many registry cleaners. Most should be used cautiously in my opinion as they can easily bugger you're system. That said, to tell people not to clean you're registry because it does not ever need it", is utter nonesense. The registry WILL degrade over time and will also slow you're system down as many entries become redundant. e.g. Almost all apps once uninstalled will still leave many surplus and/or empty registry keys behind which then impede the registry structure. The trick is to be carefull (always take a registry back-up) and use a reputable cleaner/de-fragger.(you do need to do both)
Personally, having tried many pay & free registry cleaners/de-fraggers (and been burned several times) I have found Yamicsoft XPmanager and Yamicsoft Vista manager to be the best & safest one yet. (though not the cheapest) It is however, one of the few apps I actually dont mind paying for ( hope they get a version on GOATD in the future)...lol

this type of software is just like the recent memory/RAM/optimizer/booster etc offer. Its a MYTH, cleaning the registry will not improve a computer performance. You are falling for more "snake oil."

reference:
http://www.edbott.com/weblog/?p=643

http://lifehacker.com/5033518/debunking-common-windows-performance-tweaking-myths

Ashraf (post #27), thanks a lot!
(always anxious to read your full reviews...)

I have both Glary Utilities and TuneUp Utilities ,But this prog seems superior and more complete than both of them.
I installed at first only on my XPsp3 netbook , but I have been so positively impressed by it that I installed also on all my PCs & HTPC running Vista Ultimate or XPsp3; I'm tempted to install it also on my NAS but it runs Win home Server and I'm not sure if I should, their home page does'nt say anything about it.

Anyway, Thank you very much GOTD and Elcor.
Great program

#57, Vista has a sp2 out? If so, do you have a download link?

Hi Folks, excellent constructive tuitional posts from all of you, thanks. Some useful practical notes that people can put into use :

1 Vista is going to be dumped from what the experts tell me, so you may like to consider any investment of time or money in it, re these posts. I can get Vista free, but I have stuck to XP.

2 I am only a novice, but I have found that to get a fast smooth XP depends on a number of factors:

a REG CLEANER I use 3 = CCleaner + IOBit ASC3 + PAYWARE JV16 adv functions are dangerous and for experts only, they all clean little bits that the others have missed.

b DEFRAGMENTER IOBit

c REG DEFRAGMENTER Free registry defragmenter

d SERVICES TWEAK Google this, it really increases speed & smoothness, but you'll need an expert to do this for you. I have made up a manual that takes 20 mins to institute, and I use it on all my on my builds with 100% success.

e TUNE XP system optimizer

f UNINSTALLER Revo Uninstaller

g ERASE UNUSED DISC SPACE Use Eraser, it makes a big difference, because it removes the cluster tips, so XP can move around nicely, in its partition. Remember to use Disc Cleanup to remove all but the last restore point. Non gamers use a 10gb C partition.

3 All the above progs are free, and the combination is a tried and tested complete XP Servicing Package that you need to spend a lot of time learning, to use effectively, but it is worth it. It takes me about 2 hours to teach someone to use them parrot fashion.

4 The only exception is the Reg Cleaner, JV16 is payware, so take note of what the experts on this site have said, and choose a replacement you like.

5 I have tried to present a formula for ordinary people to actually use, that works, so experts please feel welcome to explain the separate aspects for people, but smartarse one liners are not necessary.

Regards Bill.

#42:
If you have a newer desktop system costing a few grand with RAM and hard-drive space to spare, the extra resources Vista takes will hardly be noticeable. However, if you have an older system, or even one that you buy for only a few hundred (e.g. netbooks), Vista can take up too much space on the harddrive and/or too much memory, causing the PC to run slower, if at all, than with the less resource-intensive XP. It's no surprise that Microsoft extended XP licensing for low-resource devices, since Vista won't run on these at all, and until Windows 7 comes out the only other option would be Linux.

#43:
You're absolutely right: Both XP and Vista are Windows NT based Operating Systems. Microsoft almost always bases the next version of Windows off the last version of Windows. I was trying to illustrate, in a simplistic way, how similar XP and Vista are in terms of security, contrary to #6's claims. A freshly installed and fully updated XP SP3 system is going to be as secure as a freshly installed and fully updated Vista system in terms of security exploits.

I'm one of the unlucky ones who ran this software this morning, and are having to use a laptop this afternoon. I saved a Restore point ahead of time, but can't get that far in the bootup process to utilize it. I was able to select Safe Mode once, but it froze up and never completed loading.

Since then, when I try to boot up I get a "Disk Boot Failure, Insert System Disk and Press Enter" message. I have a Windows Boot Disk CD that worked about a month ago after an MBR failure, but it doesn't do anything today.

My system is (was?) XP SP3 with all current updates.

If paranoid about reg cleaners, don't avoid them!, just do some research, check out the recommendations of some of the most trusted websites, such as ZDNet & CNet, etc, read a few forums recommendations even, then choose.

Reg cleaners have become a necessity anymore, or your system will get totally bogged down! I use CCleaner, Reg Seeker, and Eusing Free Reg Cleaner, on a real regular basis. All 3 find stuff the others didn't. Have used them all 3 for quite awhile now, & I trust them. Never had even 1 problem with them!

At first I liked this giveaway, but after using it & rebooting, I found it was running at startup, which I hate, AND that the backup is NOT self-executing, so..if it had messed up my PC, what good would that have done me?? THEN I ran Eusing & Reg Seeker & both found a lot that this program didn't. And they are much simpler to use, no confusion allowed with them, whereas this does have some confusing choices to be made & thats nonsense. Anymore, if a program makes me have to figure it out, I trash it. There's better stuff out there. This 1 even left me wondering if I had actually got it to fix what it found. That & the running at startup, & the backup being almost unusable if you do have a problem, pretty much convinced me to uninstall & use my old stand-bys. Eusing makes a self-executing backup, as does CCleaner, so.. And Reg Seeker has it's own "RegEdit finder", & more. Oh yes, AND all 3 of those are FREE. Sorry, Elcor, but it's true. Thanks for letting us try it out. :)

When you begin scanning, make sure not to have any applications running; if possible, it's also smart to unload any tools running in your system tray. That's because open apps are constantly making Registry changes, and you want the Registry cleaner to do its work with no interference. Whatever you do, never choose an autoclean option, Ever! They are not to be trusted. You must, however, examine entries marked with 'Caution', 'Extreme Caution', or some other indicator of risk very carefully. I'm still not kidding.

Unless you're an advanced user and can clearly identify the scope of the entry, leave it alone. The reason is that, even if the cleaner offers an option to restore a deleted Registry entry, restoring might not be possible if the DLL entry you just deleted is essential for your system to boot. Once you give the tool the go-ahead and it starts removing Registry entries, walk away from your PC. Play with the dog, have some coffee, or watch TV. This is for safety purposes; If you're fiddling with the PC--moving the mouse, deleting desktop shortcuts, whatever--you're making changes to the Registry while a Registry cleaner is working. Not a good idea.

BEWARE! This locked up my PC totally on first run. I had to restart in Safe Mode and uninstall it. Not Happy!!!!!

Number 58, very important information. If a registry cleaner removes anything that should remain, that flaw is fatal, in light of the debatable benefits of cleaning. Premium Booster, which uses the identical registry cleaner by the same company, gave me an unbootable system.
The enigma of registry cleaners is that when they've been studied with controlled methods, they do nothing to increase speed, and the likelihood of correcting an error that will resolve an actual problem is miniscule. On the other hand, no one has refuted the logic that excessive or erroneous registry entries should slow down execution. But the only indisputable benefit of registry cleaning is making manual registry searches faster.

Hi folks,

This is a WARNING not to use "Advanced SystemCare Free" as suggested in an earlier post as a "good" possibilty of a freeware.

I installed and tried using it on Vista Home Premium 64-bit system ... and it locked up ...never got passed making a "Registry Back-Up".

Sinc eI was having problems I googled it and a lot of other people were posting Complaints of Crashes!

G!:)

Forgot,

"As long as the file is the exact size in the windows\system32 directory"

DO NOT delete any .dll file from the C:\Windows\winsxs directory or from the C:\Windows\SMINST directory. Also, don't delete any .mui files.

Try a search on your computer for msv* and see the results. Make sure you have chosen Show Hidden files and folders, uncheck Hide extensions for unknow types, and uncheck Hide protected operating system files. This is located under Folder Options.

follow-up to posts #6 and #25:

**NOTE: If your using a Toshiba, make sure the 'USER/SYSTEM'
software settings on scans DO NOT knock-out Toshiba's
'POWER-SAVER' registry entries...

...that WILL create problems

Last time this came up, it installed and worked great, but uninstalled itself a week later, possibly actually due to it's vigilance removing a part of it's own program files?

I have no way of knowing, but I'm downloading it again anyway.

Be ware of this program unless you know exactly what you are doing. These can really do some damage if you are not carful. I tend to stay away from these things. As always thanks for the free giveaway though. :)

Comodo's FREE Registry Cleaner does an EXCELLENT job - very efficient.

If you go to this site you'll see that Advanced Registry Doctor is a product from Elcor
It took out my MSSLLFile entry which was an new update to Internet Explorer....MSSLLFile\shell\open\command\: ""iexplore.exe" "%1""...This has to do with security.....VERY BAD

It removed the app path entry for for my Sound Blaster.mcl, although the path is correct and the file exists in that director.....BAD
It removed the App Paths the setup.exe and install.exe. These are the default values that are created on a Windows install.....lockOnTSNonInstallMode REG_DWORD 0x00000001(1) This can produce errors when you run programs with setup.exe or install.exe...VERY BAD

It removed the App Paths\table30.exe\UseShortName: "". No longer do my shortcuts have the name Advanced Registry Doctor - shortcut....This can only be done with a registry hack. Excellent

I did a search on my computer for msvcr71.dll and found about 10 files in different folders. As long as the file is the exact size in the windows\system32 directory, these can be safely deleted. I tested it by running each program after deleting the msvcr71.dll and they all worked fine
So when it deleted these entries, it removed the entries in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\SharedDLLs key.....VERY GOOD
I believe Advanced Registry Doctor use Uniblue's Reseller program

It removed many CLSID\Typlib entries which were pointing to programs I had uninstalled....VERY GOOD

I believe Advanced Registry Doctor use Unin-blues Reseller program.

install fine on vista sp2

#44 Apparently you have never tried to remove Norton products from your computer. If you have tried & failed, then had to use the Norton remover tool, then you have used a registry cleaner because that is pretty much what it is. I do not suggest that anyone use a registry cleaner without caution, but this can be a wonderful tool to remove all the left over crap from uninstalled programs. No program fully uninstalls from the computer and if you install several programs from this site to try & then don't like it, this tool can clean up the bits & pieces left behind.
Thank you Elcor and GAOTD for offering this program today

Now for the Vista vs. other OS's (this is not the place to discuss this)
Yes Vista has a run in compatibility mode feature, so did XP, as with the XP feature it doesn't always work.

If you are having problems with Vista locking & freezing it has to be one of 2 things, first & foremost Hardware compatibility, also Vista needs ram, get more it is cheap right now! Last is software compatibility. It is kind of like trying to get a CD to play in an 8 track tape player. It's not going happen!

The complaint about Vista & it's patches is the "same" complaint I heard about Windows95, Windows98 & XP & all the other flavors of OS's in between, when they were released.
When you think about it PC's have been in homes for a little more than 15 yrs so running an OS(XP) that is 8 yrs old. You are obsolete. Get over it, fork out the money for a good system & OS or just shut up. You are stuck in a time warp!

Vista is over 2 yrs old now.(released 3 months early on OEM computers)

My problem with Vista is the programmers of software that take more than 2 yrs to upgrade their programs to be compatible. I have seen this on this site often but it is getting better finally. I am tired of hearing from both software & hardware manufactures that MS kept the OS so secret they didn't have time to upgrade their products. They have had 2 yrs now to deal with it.

#47 I agree. I prefer Tuneup Utilities 2007 above 2008. I never got used to 2008. But I think 2009 is excellent. Far better than 2007.

Well, I really don't know what XP & Vista are built on but if you are running Vista & look in c:/program files theres a folder named windows NT. But thats not even relavent to todays offer! I'm passing mainly because I don't trust but two such programs & don't trust myself not to slip.
I've reinstalled Windows more times then I care to remember because of broken/damaged systems caused by registry cleaners. I've learned to always make a backup of the registry & a system restore point before I use any program that includes registry cleaning.
I truse two (mostly)

I appreciate the opportunity to download any use programs from time to time from Giveaway of the Day, however, when you say free for a limited time, you should do what you say. This program scans but only fixes remedial low level errors. They trap you after you get the report that shows errors beyond the scope of the remedial fixes. We will be reporting this in our report.

I only use CCleaner and Tune Up utilities.

If you want to know how fragmented your Windows' registry is, than I humbly suggest Registry Defrag [http://www.registry-clean.net/free-registry-defrag.htm]. I have no idea how well this company's products compare to anything else -- all I know is that their free defrag program will scan the registry & tell you whether you need to bother with defragging the registry or not. It takes a few minutes -- the sort of app you use when you're going to grab a cup of coffee/tea/however you take your caffeine -- but it's info not a lot of programs will give you.

Installed very easily, activated quickly, and then I ran a scan and it found and repaired over 500 problems. I'm running XP SP3, and this program worked flawlessly with my laptop. I noticed an increase in speed, and the little "hang ups" are now gone. Thanks GOTD.

#30 Thank you, Ashraf (post #27)

I too would like to say thank you to Ashraf. I've always read everyone's post (no matter what the opinion is), if the software on offer looks appealing to me, and Ashraf always posts comprehensively. I once read someone's insulting opinion that Ashraf was a "self appointed GAOTD expert". well, that person only got it half right (the latter half).

To me it never matters what people say, as long as it is constructive, and constructive can be negative too. I won't be downloading this one purely because I use something else and I'm happy with what I have, however it is nice to see all the varied comments and thus people can make a personal decision as to whether the offer of the day is any use for them.

Kind Regards,
Andy

I have used registry cleaners for years. My favorite free registry cleaners are RegScrubXP, EasyCleaner, and jv16PowerTools. (The free version is still available, but you have to search for it.)

Feel free to check out the reviews of several free registry cleaners at http://www.techsupportalert.com/best-free-registry-cleaner.htm

While there, please check out all the other freeware reviews.

I also vouch for Tuneup utilities--I feel the Tuneup2007 is better than 2008

I don't need ARDP since I already have Premium Booster (see above), as well as several other of the alternatives also listed above. BTW, I see Premium Booster is promoted on this page above, in spite of #9. In addition, I, too, hate these utilities that don't give you a choice of which actions to take--System Mechanic deleted my ZoneAlarm settings, calling them a security vulnerability, for crying out loud! Idiots!

There's nothing mysterious about Windows' registry -- software including Windows needs a place to store things, & Windows uses the registry instead of however many individual files scattered wherever on your hard drive(s). When you use a registry editor it looks bad, but that's mainly because it was never designed to look good -- it's like opening a Word doc in Notepad and seeing all the gibberish. Unfortunately the Windows' registry also gets frequently abused, most often by the folks who write all that software we [try] to use. Advanced Registry Doctor Pro tries to fix *some* of that, same as it's competition.

The big problem with fixing the registry -- the one that causes people problems -- is that it's impossible to know every program that anyone could ever try and run. And if you don't know every program, you can't know which registry entries any particular program needs. That means no one can know 100% which registry entries you can do without, so all that *any* registry cleaning tool can do is quite literally guess. [Actually that's all that anyone -- not just software -- can do, so the only value of experience is if someone finds a cure to a particular problem, & you happen to have that problem.]

The developers of Advanced Registry Doctor Pro are unusually frank about it, giving you the rundown on just what their software looks for -- just visit the FAQ linked from the product page.

So why bother? If you want to see just how much Windows reads/writes to the registry, go to Microsoft's site & download/run the free System Internals program called Process Monitor (it's small & doesn't require installation). If you don't want to bother, this program lists every time Windows reads from or writes to the registry, & lets you save that list or log... The log file for *starting* a program I was trying to troubleshoot was ~1/2 a GB! Now that log also lists things like the constant banter between my mouse software & Windows, but that's not the point... the point is that Windows does use the registry that often, that much, so *anything* slowing that down is going to have an impact. Indeed, I've never seen anyone say NOT to clean the registry... every caution &/or problem report concerns removing the wrong registry entry or entries.

Nothing is foolproof, so you need to be sure that you can back up your registry & restore it just in case. For XP I recommend ERUNT. For Vista, use ERUNT to backup followed by manually creating a restore point using System Restore. ERUNT can restore just your registry when Windows won't start (see the included doc). System Restore can't. No other Windows program can that I'm aware of. Vista stores info in places besides the registry, so System Restore *might* do a better job of putting everything back, but with ERUNT you'll still get Windows running again so you can use System Restore. Again, read ERUNT's doc though (wouldn't hurt to print it), making sure you have/know what you need... having an ERUNT backup won't do a bit of good if you can't boot your PC to use it, especially if you can't read the instructions without your PC running.

Absolute junk! This will slow down any computer and break many. There is no reason to remove any registry entry! It will not speed up your computer! Any registry cleaner is scamware!

#34~Jay G. You said "Vista is based on XP (Or rather, Server 2003, which is based on XP)."

I say: Vista AND XP are "NT Based Systems"

Number 24 Your so wrong my VISTA far exceeds speed of my XP on the same AlienWare Area51 7500 Desktop, maybe its Your machine, and as for running out of memory and space with VISTA, 30 things going at once cpu maxed out most of the time doing tasks and yet no problems here, more ram, more hd space, faster cpu i guess that's why besides they are AlienWare PC's of cutting edge quality (To spare You all the specs...) so I guess that's why I have zero performance issues with any operating system so long as I "MANAGE IT" if not iam screwed no matter what, Have a good online experience!

- Despite Ashraf's execllent writeup and recommendation to avoid, this is the first Registry tool I've put on my system. For me, it's like having a new computer, it boots so much faster, and while I admit I don't like the all-or-nothing tweak aspect, nor the cryptic "malicious" software settings, for basic search and destroy on the Registry it seems to have done a darned good job.
- The only UI bug I found is when I use CTRL to select multiple "problems", then tell it to fix them, it doesn't. It will fix all in a category, and it will fix individual problems, but it simply would not do an ad-hoc selection.
- One thing I *really* like is the ability to export problems and fix history, so I can track what I've done over time. Very nifty.
- And it Activates as non-admin. Can't *do* anything as non-admin, but that's not the point; the point is it does activate and it does run, unlike a few other GOATD offerings.
- All in all I'd have to call this one a keeper.

#23, proffate

No, it's a repeat - exactly the same version as on 09/24/2007 (8.8.21.).
A system optimizer getting no update within 15 months ... This could fuel speculations in terms of reliability and trustworthiness.
My own experience with the program, though, is thoroughly positive!

#6 StanDp

You can run just about any program now with vista64. If the program does not work there is an option to install it under XP. The program will think that the OS is XP and will load... This option is built into Vista
in Vista open your help and support then type install program then click on the "start the program Compatibility wizzard" You can install programs making the comp think it is an older version (XP) of windows not Vista

This is a great one, I had it and lost it to a hard drive failure.
I hoped you would have it again, but was hoping after I got my new hard drive...lol.
But this is one of the good one you can run and not worry if it will
kill anything. I had it since the last time it was offered, and used it a lot. Great program......

Programs like this is like walking into a mine field.
Beware if you don't know what you are doing!