Best Cleaner Reviews Free Registry Cleaners
Best Cleaner Reviews Windows 8.1 Windows 8
Best Cleaner Reviews Download Page That

Best Cleaner Reviews Download Page That

While we link to their much more clear builds page elsewhere in this review, the standard CCleaner download page that most people end up on is a little confusing.

Tim Fisher has 30 years professional technology support experience.

He writes troubleshooting content and is the General Manager of Lifewire.

Best Cleaner Reviews Free Registry Cleaners

CCleaner tops our list of free registry cleaners for several good reasons.

Aside from being completely free and working with all versions of Windows, two additional things really stand out.

For one, weve never had CCleaner cause a problem in the Windows Registry, which some less-well-done registry repair tools do on a regular basis.

And two, because its optionally available in a portable format (i.e., it doesnt need to be installed).

Please let us know if theres a newer version we need to review.

Best Cleaner Reviews Windows 8.1 Windows 8

The most recent version of CCleaner works with 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows 10, Windows 8 (including Windows 8.1 Windows 8.1 Update ), and Windows 7.

Portable, which we recommend, doesnt require installation at all.

Slim is the same as the normal installer option but without the additional software installation option.

Its probably more accurately called a system cleaner because it actually cleans a lot more than just your registry.

As far as the registry cleaning functions are concerned, CCleaner, like all registry cleaners, is primarily concerned with removing entries in the Windows Registry that refer to files, programs, or other resources that no longer exist.

For example, CCleaner will remove registry keys and registry values that point to programs and files that no longer exist in Windows.

These abilities are exactly why running CCleaner, or another well-designed registry cleaner, is a great troubleshooting step when faced with a missing file or cannot find a file sort of errors, especially as Windows starts.

Specifically, CCleaner will remove registry entries that point to the following if they no longer exist: DLL files, file extensions, ActiveX objects, type libraries, applications and application paths, fonts, help files, installers, software, MUI cache, sound events, and services.

Outside of the registry, CCleaner also removes temporary browser data like cookies, history, and the cache from all popular browsers.

You can also do things like empty the Recycle Bin, clear MRU lists, empty the thumbnail cache in Windows, remove old memory dumps and log files, and much more.

CCleaner also has a Tools area where you can uninstall programs, view and change the programs that start up with Windows, find and remove files that are taking up lots of disk space, find duplicate files, remove restore points, and even wipe a drive.

It doesnt advertise to fix all the problems under the sun like so many registry repair tools do.

We very much like that there are a few ways to install CCleaner.

And while were usually a very big fan of portable programs, one advantage of actually installing CCleaner is the addition of Run CCleaner and Open CCleaner right-click options to your Recycle Bin.

If youre planning on using CCleaner for general system cleaning, this is a really handy feature.

My only real complaint about CCleaner is the confusing download page, which you can see here.

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