Clean-Up Software

[Tubbycoates]

Hi all, me again

Further to previous questioalled Avast and it's fine.

However, the other day it did a Grimefighter scan and told me that I have over 30 files that are slowing my PC down. To clea, it wants to charge me an annual fee.

Now I'm unemployed, potless and tight, so, is there any free software available to do the same thing please?

Thanks all in advance

[Buenchico]

You probably don't need to do anything anyway Avast would like you to pay for its optimisation tool. While it's safe to use you probably wouldn't notice much (if any) difference if you ran it.

One of the things it does though (as well as general 'optimisation') is to seek out malware, which is definitely a good idea. To do that for free you can use the free version of Malwarebytes Anti-Malware. (I'd recommend that everyone should have it on their computer and carry out a scan every week or two):
https://www.malwarebytes.org/antimalware/
(When installing it, take care to deselect the option to install a free trial of the 'Premium' version).

If you want to go beyond that, and seek out stuff that might be cluttering up your computer, there are plenty of free programs that claim to do exactly that but I wouldn't trust the vast majority of them. However CCleaner Free is widely recommended by the technical press:
http://www.piriform.com/ccleaner/download
(I've got it on my own computer and I do use it occasionally).

I also like (and sometimes use) the free version of Glary Utilities:
http://www.glarysoft.com/
which is also well-reviewed.
(Don't be put off by the reference to payment on that page. It only applies to the 'Pro' version. The 'Download Now' link gets you the fee one).

[Tubbycoates]

Brilliant! Just what I'd hoped for.

Thanks for your help.

[HansUrbancka]

I agree with Buenchico as regards Malwarebytes but would advise you to stay well clear of CCleaner which if Not used very carefully could cause untold problems with the Registry in your Operating System.

Glary Utilities is something I have not heard about, so am unable to comment.

Hans.

[ivor4781]

there you go again HansUrbancka
badmouthing cc cleaner
your probably the only guy on here thats got anything to said bad about it
if it ba**sed up your comp you didnt use it correctly.in its default setting it works perfectly safe

[1ozzy]

Ccleaner and also Defraggler, both supplied by Piriform and also Glary Utilities, supplied by Glarysoft I have found to be very useful on my older computors.
They are very easy to use, (make sure you read the instructions).

[bibblebub]

I have used a lot of clean-up programs over the years but am currently in a period of giving them (mostly) a miss. I found that the most sensible time to try out a new one was immediately after doing a disk image backup, so that it was simple to restore my system to a known state if something went horribly wrong.

The one that I have previously used most is Advanced SystemCare by IOBit which didn't cause me any problems (as far as I am aware).
The 1 problem I had with Glary Utilities was that as part of its registry clean-up entries for Picasa were removed causing that to fail (but I no longer use Picasa so I could go back to using Glary if I wanted).
CCleaner currently gives me a problem by removing registry file paths for The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection (which is currently freely available) and it causes that game to fail to start; it is a minor annoyance that is readily rectified by repairing the game in the games hub from which it is played.

So, even clean-up software that a lot of people recommend as being ok can cause problems.