What Should I Clean With CCleaner?
Dear Lifehacker, I heard that you (and others) recommend CCleaner as a Windows servicing tool , but I’m not really sure what to do with it. Should I just clean everything up? Will it really make my computer faster? I’m a little overwhelmed here, help!
Best regards, Confused Cleaner
Dear Confused, CCleaner may seem a little confusing for newbies, so this is a great question. In fact, we do not necessarily recommend using all the options in the program. Here’s what to use.
What CCleaner does
Most people think of CCleaner as a maintenance tool that will improve your computer’s performance. This is only half true. Simply put, CCleaner is a disk cleanup tool. Its cleaner will remove temporary files and also includes tools to remove programs, identify the files that are taking up the most space on your computer, and find duplicate files. It all serves one purpose: to free up space on your hard drive. (It’s just better than Windows’ built-in disk cleanup tool.)
If your disk is nearly full, freeing up space can help improve performance, but running CCleaner daily won’t give you a significant performance boost. In fact, in some cases it could even slow things down.
Let’s dive deeper into what each tool does and talk about how to get the most out of it.
Purifier
The main function of CCleaner is “Cleaner”, which you will find under the tab of the same name. This will remove temporary files from your browsers and other programs, including system programs like Windows Explorer.
As we mentioned earlier, cleaning up these files – especially if they are taking up a lot of space – can help your computer perform a little better. But some of these files actually speed up your computer, and deleting them slows you down. Your browser cache, for example, stores images and other files so they load faster the next time you open this website. Windows Explorer Thumbnail Cache helps load folders with a lot of images or videos without reloading thumbnails every time. And your browser cookies allow you to stay on your favorite sites, so you don’t have to log in again every day.
So, before you run the cleaner, think about what you really want to clean up in the first place. If you want to keep these caches and cookies to make things run a little faster, uncheck their boxes in the CCleaner sidebar. (You can also whitelist certain cookies, such as gmail.com, in the CCleaner options.) However, if you want your web browsing to remain private , you can clear them more often . Cleaning up temporary files is also a good first step in troubleshooting an incorrect program.
In short: there is nothing wrong with cleaning these files regularly, but your computer can run faster if you leave certain things unchecked and clean them less often . You can also click the Analyze button before running the cleaner to see which items are taking up the most space.
Registry cleaner
Registry cleaners are a slightly different beast. Unlike the program for cleaning temporary files, we do not recommend running it on a schedule. While registry cleaners can help if something has damaged your system, they most likely won’t improve performance under normal circumstances, and in some cases, they might even cause damage. So, if you have no problem with a program that won’t start (or even won’t install), I would leave it alone.
In short: if the registry is healthy, don’t fix it .
Other tools
If you go to the Tools tab, you’ll see some of CCleaner’s other useful tidbits. Typically, most of these processes are better served by other programs , but it’s a good idea to have them all in one place.
Uninstall : This is basically the same as the Windows built-in Uninstall menu, but it’s just put there for your convenience. We usually recommend running a more thorough uninstaller like Revo , so I would skip this tool.
Startup : Contrary to its name, this section contains much more than just startup items. Not only can you customize which programs start when your computer starts, but you can also disable or remove scheduled tasks, browser extensions, and context menu items (if the right-click menu is a bit cluttered). Again, you can already do most of this through Windows itself, but now it’s all in one convenient place. Just use the tabs at the top of this section to navigate.
Disk Analyzer : If you’re running out of hard disk space and running Cleaner doesn’t help, try Disk Analyzer. It will scan your hard drive and tell you which file types are taking up the most space (photos, music, videos, etc.). I usually recommend using a more powerful tool like WinDirStat as it can sort this information by folder as well, but CCleaner’s built-in tool is pretty decent.
Duplicate Finder : Ever feel like you’ve accidentally copied the same set of files twice to your computer? Perhaps you have the same movie stored in two folders, or you have several of the same photos scattered throughout your photo library. Either way, CCleaner’s duplicate finder can help you find duplicate files using file names, sizes, modified date, and more. There are more advanced tools out there , but this one is a good place to start.
System Restore : This section allows you to delete restore points to free up disk space. You can do this through System Properties> System Protection in Windows, but CCleaner’s interface is a little simpler.
Drive Wiper : Securely remove hard drives you want to sell or throw away. This won’t work on your boot drive – you’ll need a live CD for that – but if you’re just erasing the extra hard drive you have lying around, it helps.
This sounds like a lot, but at the end of the day, CCleaner is pretty easy to use if you know what to look for. It’s a great disk space cleaner that has several troubleshooting tools built in, making it an indispensable tool for any Windows PC – just don’t think of it as a performance magic wand.
Regards, Lifehacker