My computers been slowing down. I'm pretty good with computers. no viruses or any spy ware.

harddrive is about 50% free, defragmented.

I opened up my registry (start > run > regedit)
and was amazed at all the folders. Things like Kazaa that haven't been on my computer in years. I was going through it, deleted a few things, but theres just too much. Is there a program i could use? There are a lot of things on my computer that I haven't used in a while, but would like to keep...so I don't want it to just delete all programs that havent been used in a while. suggestions?

Is it safe to delete 'empty' folders and registry without values?

It would not be wise to delete any folders unless you know exactly what they do , and are 100% certain they are not needed. And note it generally causes no problems to have these abandoned (orphaned) entries in the Registry as Windows is able to go directly to the information needed, rather than sort through everything to find what it needs. Most of these entries are abandoned when poorly coded uninstall routines fail to clean up properly, or for some other reason, a program was uninstalled incorrectly. In other words, most problems are not things that need to be fixed.

Before doing anything, backup all data you don't want to lose. Then backup your Registry.

• Download, install, and run ERUNT,
• When prompted to add ERUNT to the Start-up folder, click No,
• Start ERUNT, select Ok to continue,
• In the box that opens, select the save location for the backup (the default is recommended),
• Ensure the "System registry" and "Current user registry" options are checked,
• Click OK,
• When prompted, click Yes to create a new folder,
• When Registry backup is complete notice appears, note restore instructions, then click OK.

There are several Registry cleaners that promise to "optimize" your computer, and improve performance to make it run better than ever, risk free. Take that with a grain of salt, as mostly marketing "fluff". Especially the risk free part! ANY time you mess with the Registry, there is SERIOUS potential for total Windows corruption.

There is great controversy as to whether performance improves by purging the Registry of these orphans, with very vocal arguments from both sides. I'm in the middle. I use CCleaner's Registry cleaner on my systems. This is the only Registry tool I recommend because (1) it is not overly aggressive and (2) it always prompts to backup the Registry before making changes. It is often necessary to scan for issues 2 or 3 times until it reports, "No issues were found".

Beginners and experts alike can benefit from the CCleaner Beginner's Guide.

I would add one more item to the list of;
ERUNT
CCleaner * See below

ADD:
RegSeeker
Open it, click on Clean The Registry, then OK.

Once it's finished, along the bottom of the screen, click on Select, choose "Select All". Then click on Action, then "Delete selected items".

All deleted items will be backed up, just click OK for the default backup filenames/locations. Close the program and restart the machine.



* For CCleaner;
Once you download and install it, open the program then click on (left hand side) OPTIONS, then COOKIES. Any cookies you want to save (trusted sites, places you have usernames/passwords), highlight them in the left column, then (using the directional arrows between the panes), move them to the right hand column under "Cookies to keep".

Still under Options, click on Advanced. Remove the check mark from the box for "Only delete files in Windows Temp
folders older than 48 hours".

Leave all other settings at the default.

Then click on Cleaner (on the top left). When that window opens, click on Run Cleaner (bottom right of the
window.)

When it finishes, close CCleaner, and restart your machine. (Some files will not be deleted until a restart is performed.)

I do not advocate running CCleaner on each boot. I run it once or twice a week.

@Dan - note that's not your typical link to CCleaner but to CCleaner "Slim", which does not try to foist the Yahoo Toolbar on our machines. The rest of the advice concerning CCleaner configuration still applies, though.

Sorry, that's an "old" line in my list of links. I had meant to delete it.

My link is the same as yours;
CCleaner - Download

No Dan, I meant my link is not your typical CCleaner link, and is not the same as yours. Yours goes to the normal CC download page. Mine goes to the "slim" download page.

Do we need to update our canned messages. Once when XP was slowing me down a friend recommended using a registry defragger. Do you know anything about those? I had never heard of such a thing at the time but I downloaded it and tried it. All it told me was basically that it couldn't help me so I ended up having to reinstall XP.

Have you checked this out?

Digerati,

I meant that the two links take you to the same program source, just different "flavours".

Umm, no not exactly. My link takes you to CCleaners's web site (not a 3rd party site like filehippo) and it downloads the exact same source code and version of CCleaner. The difference is in the installer. The installer for my download link, (CCleaner) does not include code to install the Yahoo toolbar.

I was editing out the File Hippo ref. (when my Dr. called) and when I came back and finished you had posted. What I meant was the same "basic" page.