Category: Windows

Why I don’t use registry cleaners

Welcome, Digg visitors. Wow, twice in three days an old post of mine gets picked up and Dugg like crazy. Just to be clear: If you have a specific problem with removing a specific program, a registry cleaning utility might be able to identify keys that will help you solve that specific problem. But that’s a rare scenario. Most people I know use registry cleaners as part of their magic cleanup routine, and I see very little upside and a lot of potential downside in this sort of routine use. Specifically, as I write below, I have never seen any evidence that routine “cleaning” of the registry has any positive effect. I stand behind that statement.

Via Matt Goyer, John Hoole offers this cautionary tale:

just a note to say if you have Windows XP Media Center Edition 2005 (probably all versions actually) steer clear of registry clean programs such as Reg Mechanic they go through your registry and delete unnecessary keys….. sounds good but it didn’t count on Media Center I ran it a few days back and when I came to use Media Center it loaded then produced a crash report and died, took me ages to figure it out until I came to run Reg Mechanic again and realized This program deletes DLL files too so….. I restored the first backup and rebooted and media center worked fine so if you have that error on startup that’s your problem right there. Just restore the backup from Reg Mechanic. So you have been warned.

I’d go a step further: Don’t run registry cleaner programs, period. I won’t go so far as to call them snake oil, but what possible performance benefits can you get from “cleaning up” unneeded registry entries and eliminating a few stray DLL files? Even in the best-case scenario the impact should be trivial at best. Maybe a second or two here and there, maybe a few kilobytes of freed-up RAM, and I’m being generous. How can you balance those against the risk that the utility will “clean” (in other words, delete) something you really need, causing a program or feature to fail?

If anyone has done any serious performance testing on this class of software, I’d be interested in seeing it. In the absence of really rigorous testing and fail-safe design, I say: Stay far away from this sort of utility.

If you have a counter-argument to make, leave a comment. But simply saying, “I use Reg-o-matic Deluxe and my computer is way faster than ever!” isn’t good enough. Show me the data!

Update: I did a Google search for “registry cleaner” performance tests, and got more than 25,000 hits. In the first 15 pages, however, there wasn’t a single example of an actual performance test. Virtually all the results were from companies that make and sell this sort of utility, or from download sites that have affiliate agreements with these developers. I found one recent how-to article from Ed Tittel on TechWeb. Ed asserts that “Most Windows experts recommend a Registry clean-up on all systems at least once every six months.” He didn’t link to any of those experts, however.

Later in the same article, Ed advises: “I urge you to check comparative reviews, ratings, and rankings of Registry Clean-up Tools before you invest hard-earned dollars on these products.” Sadly, there are no links here either. I suspect that’s because detailed comparative reviews of this class of software don’t exist. Ironically, the article inadvertently documents the case against this sort of utility. Early on, it states: “The typical Windows system has literally hundreds of thousands of Registry entries.” The screen shot from the free utility he spotlights shows a grand total of 19 “errors,” most of which are simply pointers to CLSIDs that don’t exist. Is it really worth spending hours on this task? I don’t think so.

The best bit of reading I found in my search was this rant from a poster named Jabarnut on a thread at DSL Reports’ Software Forum:

The Registry is an enormous database and all this “Cleaning” really doesn’t amount to much…I’ve said this before, but I liken it to “sweeping out one parking space in a parking lot the size of Montana” … a registry “tweak” here and there is desirable or even necessary sometimes, but random “cleaning”, especially for the novice, is inviting disaster.

I also would like someone to show me any hard evidence that registry cleaning actually improves performance. (Unless there is a specific problem that has to be addressed by making changes to the registry).

Sorry to go on like this, but I feel there is way to much Registry “Cleaning” going on these days just for the sake of “cleaning”.

Amen.

Update 11-Sep: Several commenters have made a good case for a handful of utilities that include registry repair and cleaning options. They make the point that these are useful when used intelligently, not indiscriminately. My colleague George Ou from ZDNet passed along these comments:

I do like the free CCleaner. I’ve cleaned out 1 GB or more of junk on friends computers and it does make the system a little more responsive. You don’t get as many unexplained pauses. This is a problem with the lack of multithreading in Windows Explorer most of the time when it times out on dead resources like a detached network drive. I thought I remember reading something on the Vista features that fixes this by supporting multiple threads.

Other than that, I’ve made sure that I don’t have any dead links the system is trying to access on the desktop that are sure to cause a 30 second lockup even if I drag an icon across the dead link icon. Ccleaner also does a nice job removing a lot of that junk. The combination of MSCONFIG and Ccleaner works wonders.

OK, I’ll give it a try.

Finally, a (partial) solution for “poisoned” Windows Media files!

Update: The original version of this post contained an error. According to my testing, the most recent version of Windows Media Player 10 does not include all of the fixes referred to in this article. The Windows Media FAQ offers this confusing explanation: “If you installed the latest update to Windows Media Player 10 (version 10.00.00.3802 or later), clearing [the Acquire Licenses Automatically] setting will potentially affect all protected files that you try to play, burn, or synchronize. If you have not installed the latest update to Windows Media Player 10, this setting will only affect certain types of protected files.” See the updated instructions below.

Microsoft has finally released an update that protects some users of Windows Media Player 9 Series from media files that try to install spyware/adware by exploiting a flaw in the license acquisition process. (For background on this issue, see How to fumble a security update.)

The procedure for fixing this issue varies depending on your Windows version and which version of Windows Media Player you’ve chosen to use. Microsoft has done a terrible job of getting out the word that an update is available, and as a result most Windows users are still unprotected. The full version of this post contains detailed instructions and is a must-read for any Windows user.

Continue reading “Finally, a (partial) solution for “poisoned” Windows Media files!” →

Tip of the day: Drop a file into an open window

One of the most efficient ways to open a file is to drag it directly from the desktop or an Explorer window and drop it in a program window that’s already open. By using this technique instead of double-clicking, you control exactly which program opens the file. But what do you do when the program you want to use is minimized or covered up by other windows? Use an expert technique called “drag and hover.”

Click the file you want to open and hold down the mouse button. Drag the file on top of the taskbar button for the program you want to use — but don’t let go of the mouse button yet, or you’ll get an error message! (If the button is grouped to represent multiple windows, wait until the list of available windows appears, and then move the pointer over the window you want to use.) After a brief pause, the program or folder window associated with the taskbar button appears on the screen, above all other windows. Now drag the file icon up to the window and drop it. In some cases you may find that you need to drop the file on the window’s title bar for it to open properly.

In Microsoft Word, for instance, dropping the icon for a Word document into an open document window inserts the content of the new file into the existing file; to open the file in a new window, aim the mouse pointer at the title bar before releasing the button. Likewise, if you drop the icon for a text file into a Word document window, the file is inserted as an embedded object; drop it on the title bar to open the text file for editing in Word.

The Longhorn timetable

Microsoft Watch has some interesting Longhorn tidbits, starting with this tentative schedule:

  • April 2005: Preview/pre-beta release to OEMs and software vendors at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference.
  • Summer 2005 (Microsoft is saying early; we’re hearing July/August): Longhorn Beta 1 released to testers.
  • Late 2005 to mid-2006: Interim Longhorn builds (similar to the Community Technology Preview releases that Microsoft’s developer division has been delivering) go to testers
  • Some time in the first half of 2006: Beta 2 released
  • Q3/Q4 2006: Longhorn released to manufacturing and delivered to PC makers so they can preload it on new machines
  • Holiday season 2006: Longhorn hits retail

Well, that’s pretty ambitious, especially given that the story later quotes Allchin as saying, “Beta 1 is only going to be about one-third feature-complete when it hits this summer…” I’ll have to go back through my notes from the XP development cycle and see if there were any similar promises. August 2006 is when it would have to be out to qualify for holiday season shipments, and that’s a pretty ambitious schedule.

Overclocking is bad for your PC’s health

Microsoft’s Raymond Chen (whose epitaph will no doubt include the words, “developer of the original Tweak UI utility for Windows”) put up a fascinating post earlier this week. It’s worth reading for two reasons. First, it details how Microsoft engineers really do use the data you submit when your Windows computer crashes. Second, it highlights a problem that might be affecting you right now:

Since the failure rate for this particular error was comparatively high (certainly higher than the one or two I was getting for the failures I was looking at), he requested that the next ten people to encounter this error be given the opportunity to leave their email address and telephone number so that he could call them and ask follow-up questions. Some time later, he got word that ten people took him up on this offer, and he sent each of them e-mail asking them various questions about their hardware configurations, including whether they were overclocking.

Five people responded saying, “Oh, yes, I’m overclocking. Is that a problem?”

The other half said, “What’s overclocking?” He called them and walked them through some configuration information and was able to conclude that they were indeed all overclocked. But these people were not overclocking on purpose. The computer was already overclocked when they bought it. These “stealth overclocked” computers came from small, independent “Bob’s Computer Store”-type shops, not from one of the major computer manufacturers or retailers.

For both groups, he suggested that they stop overclocking or at least not overclock as aggressively. And in all cases, the people reported that their computer that used to crash regularly now runs smoothly.

I’ve done my fair share of overclocking through the years, but currently I’m running every single computer I own (five, at the moment) at its rated speed. It helps that I’m not a gamer – that’s the group that, in my experience, is most fanatical about squeezing performance out of a PC, even at the expense of stability. And most online communities dedicated to hardware tweaks for hardcore gamers spend a lot of time explaining how to overclock to the point where your computer doesn’t crash. You can push it up a notch at a time until it fails, and then back off. Or you can start high, crash, and back down a notch at a time until the crashes stop.

Either way, you’ve created an environment in which some degree of instability is practically guaranteed. If you have mysterious performance problems or compatibility issues, anything short of a blue screen, can you safely say that the hardware isn’t the problem?

Oh, and if I bought a computer from someone who had overclocked it without my knowledge, I would be as mad as hell. That’s fraud, plain and simple. As Raymond says, “There’s a lot of overclocking out there, and it makes Windows look bad.” Unnecessarily, I might add.

A Longhorn insider speaks

Sean Alexander has been a great source of information on Media Center for a long time. Now he’s on the Longhorn team, and today he has his first post as a Longhorn insider:

  1. There will be a LH build given out at WinHEC.  This will not be Beta 1. This is a driver and hardware developer release to get the industry building hardware solutions for Longhorn.  Beta 1 will be this summer.
  2. I used to get really bummed by the “grouping” feature in Windows XP – r-mouse in My Documents and choose “Arrange Icons By|Show in Groups”.  Some thought it was fantastic but for me it wasn’t very compelling when I have family members who still can’t find the files they’ve just downloaded.  The ability to visualize and organize your information in Longhorn kicks ass.  It’s FAST already and going to get even better.  It goes beyond physical location of files. WinFS wasn’t required to deliver this and that’s where I think many stumbled in their perceptions.
  3. Don’t expect to see a lot of updates to or new consumer-focused features right now. Right now it’s about fundamentals- getting hardware to work great, tapping into features that are in most PCs lying dormant for 90%+ of your time, addressing how people view and organize their information. They’ll be plenty of cool new wizardry to come.

I’ve seen the “grouping” feature he mentions in item #2, and yes, it really is cool. In fact, I’d go so far as to predict that Longhorn will basically render all existing desktop search tools obsolete. Beta 1 this summer? Perfect timing!

A sneak peek at Longhorn

eWeek sat down with Microsoft VP Jim Allchin, who showed a demo of the next version of Windows (code-named Longhorn) and talked about Why Longhorn Matters. The short version? “Longhorn is going to be a heck of a lot more than just Windows XP Service Pack 3.”

I’ll be at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) in Seattle later this month, where a lot of this stuff should be demonstrated publicly for the first time. And I’m in early discussions to write at least one and probably several books about Longhorn. Stay tuned to this space for more details.

Tip of the day: Manage saved passwords

Windows XP provides a secure system for storing sensitive data associated with Web pages you visit using Internet Explorer. This data store includes saved user names, passwords, and Web form data you “remember” using the AutoComplete feature in Internet Explorer. Occasionally, people ask me where this data is stored, assuming (logically) that it has to be saved somewhere and that these saved passwords could represent a security risk.

Here’s the good news: The Protected Storage service, which runs as part of the Local Security Administration subsystem (Lsass.exe) manages this data store. This data is encrypted using your logon credentials and is stored in a secure portion of the registry. For security reasons, you cannot view the hashed data directly. Instead, Windows allows programs to query for specific data. The Protected Storage service decrypts the data only when it can verify that the request is accompanied by the correct logon credentials – in other words, that whoever is making the request is currently logged on using the same account that was used to store the data.

What happens if you forget a saved password that you use to access a secure Web site? Although you can log on using the saved credentials, you can’t read the password or export it to another program. That’s especially unfortunate if you’re switching to a new PC, because the Files and Settings Transfer Wizard doesn’t migrate saved passwords either.

The solution? Download a copy of the free Protected Storage Explorer. This tool queries the Protected Storage database and dumps its contents into an Explorer-style window that you can use to browse saved passwords for e-mail accounts, FTP servers, Web sites, and other normally hidden locations. You must be logged on to a user account to view saved data for that account. Needless to say, the existence of a tool like this should inspire you to lock your computer when you step away from your desk.

[Some of the material in this tip originally appeared in Windows XP Inside Out, Second Edition.]

Tip of the day: Log out in a hurry

Think of this as the 21st Century equivalent of the “boss key.” When you hear footsteps and you want to clear the contents of the screen right now, hold down the Windows logo key and tap L. In Windows XP, that shortcut takes you to the logon screen if you have Fast User Switching enabled. If you log on to a Windows domain server on a corporate network, or if you’ve disabled Fast User Switching, or if you’re using Windows 2000, the Windows logo+L shortcut locks the computer, displaying a logon dialog box that doesn’t go away until you enter your password.