Hi, I've been trying to speed up my PC by using CCleaner, but I'm not sure how safe the registry cleaner is. Whilst I know the need to make a backup of the registry first, are there any cleaning options on the left hand side toolbar that are less risky, and have no chance of causing problems.
Thanks
I've never had a problem with CCleaner's registry tool, and I've been using it for a while. It allows you to choose which issues to fix, and it asks if you want to back up each time, so it's as safe as anything else IMHO.
I've been using CCleaner pretty much daily for ... at least five years, probably longer, and I think its registry cleaner may have caused one problem once, a long time ago, so it seems to be rather safe, even when you tick all the categories for cleaning (I haven't bothered to make registry backups before cleaning for the past three or more years either. Which is stupid, of course, but does show that it's pretty safe).
I'm not sure how it is now, but it used to be that the ActiveX category was unchecked as default, so perhaps that's the most risky section.
So when it gives you options such as fix "Missing Shared DLLs", or "Windows Services", none of those pose any particular risk to change?
Not in my experience. The missing shared DLLs seem to mostly be ones that have been replaced with newer versions which are placed in a different directory than the old ones. And Windows services would also only be removed from the registry if they don't exist on the system (or they're not where the registry points to, but if so, you would probably already have had problems), I believe.Originally Posted by piggydiggy
Shouldn't be too much of a risk, but do make a backup. Just in case
I'll reiterate what's already been said. I've been using CCleaner daily for about 3 years with no problems. It's another great tool in my arsenal that I use regular to help keep my computer running smoothly. Another good tool I use is Auslogics Registry Cleaner. Sometimes this will find things CCleaner missed. Although I'm not sure of the specific differences between how the two applications find and repair registry errors. But again, never had any issues with either. Be sure to make backups every time and you should be fine.
Pretty much all registry cleaners are completely safe because pretty much all of them do bugger-all. CCleaner falls into this category.
Don't expect any trouble, but don't expect any performance increase either.
I make a fair bit of money on the side fixing the computers of people who buy registry cleaners and then mess up their machines. Luddites and tools means you get to charge $50 to reinstall a print spooler.
Once a League of Legends update created literally thousands of registry errors on my computer... CCleaner was a godsend for that.
CCleaner works and is safe. Don't install the bullshit toolbar it comes with though.
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