I am looking at UniBlue's registry cleaner. Does it seem like it's worth the $30? UniBlue registry cleaner [Edited by - Ravuya on August 16, 2009 12:45:33 AM]

Of course not. No "registry cleaner" is worth the cost, just as no "Finally Fast" or "PC Tune-Up" or any of the other sham products sold to clueless computer users is worth the cost.

Very few registry settings affect system stability, and those that do are not things you want to lightly play with. You want to read the documentation, where available, and make an informed decision about them.

If you think your computer's slow, start with HiJackThis. It's free.

A far better investment, if you're worried about issues with your windows install, is to just buy an external drive, back up important files, and just reinstall windows.

If you want to cleanout bad entries in our registry grab the trial edition of http://www.yamicsoft.com/ and run through their registry cleaner.

Other than that, most of the time the registry is a non-issue, biggest slowdown you will encounter will be software you've installed that's loading at startup. 90% of those can be disabled, and the other 10% you shouldn't have installed in the first place (because they're shit).

Run msconfig and turn them all off. Enjoy. Avoid killing services since you probably don't know what you're doing. If you have Norton that is prior to 2009, remove it and get something better. If you have trend micro or McAssy, uninstall with extreme prejudice. Feel free to rape and murder the manufacturers while uninstalling that shit too. I've had good luck with NOD32 and Avast. Frankly though I just avoid catching viruses [grin].

Run through Malwarebytes and Combofix to cleanup the system, just in case you have any spyware, malware, or other crap. Combofix is not something you should run regularly, but it is useful for removing plenty of fun little bugs that get into your system and hijack various things. Spybot is ok, but doesn't catch a lot of stuff, and Adaware has the same problem as spybot...

I only ever reinstall my OS when a new version is out or my hardware changes significantly. Other than that, I've not had to reinstall my OS for any reason.

If you're one of the many people that has difficulty keeping your computer running at a reasonable speed over time due to creeping crapware, you might want to look into installing Windows SteadyState next time you reinstall windows.

If you want to lose 30 €, get Auslogics BoostSpeed. It's comprehensive and works.

Thank you for the informed replies.