CCleaner Review

Lets start with the developers description of CCleaner:

CCleaner is a freeware system optimization and privacy tool. It removes unused files from your system – allowing Windows to run faster and freeing up valuable hard disk space. It also cleans traces of your online activities such as your Internet history. But the best part is that it’s fast (normally taking less than a second to run) and contains NO Spyware or Adware!

Sounds good, right? Lets have a closer look on what CCleaner actually cleans:

Temp files and similar from the following applications:

• Internet Explorer
• Recycle Bin
• Clipboard
• Windows Temporary files
• Windows Log files
• Recent Documents (on the Start Menu)
• Run history (on the Start Menu)
• Windows XP Search Assistant history
• Windows XP old Prefetch data
• Windows memory dumps after crashes
• Chkdsk file fragments

Temporary files and recent file lists for the following applications:

• Firefox
• Opera
• Safari
• Media Player
• eMule
• Kazaa
• Google Toolbar
• Netscape
• Microsoft Office
• Nero
• Adobe Acrobat Reader
• WinRAR
• WinAce
• WinZip

and more…
You may also choose to clean:

• Menu Order cache
• Tray Notifications Cache
• Window Size and Location Cache
• User Assist history
• IIS Log Files
• Custom Folders

We do not recommend you choosing the last six them if you aren’t a advanced user
and know what you are doing.
What we think so far:
The list is long, but running CCleaner doesn’t take a lot of time. We have also experienced that we got more disc space to play with after deleting lots of temp files, if you have used your computer for
some time it isn’t unusual that CCleaner would delete several
gigabytes of crap. Remember to defrag your hard drive if this happens to you!
The registry cleaning:
CCleaner is designed from the ground to be safe and secure to use. It has
multiple levels of checks in place to ensure that it won’t delete any useful information or documents you may still need.

CCleaner is capable of cleaning the following entries from the registry:

• File Extensions
• ActiveX Controls
• ClassIDs
• ProgIDs
• Uninstallers
• Shared DLLs
• Fonts
• Help File references
• Application Paths
• Icons
• Invalid Shortcuts and more…

Our Conclusion:

We have been using CCleaner for several months now, and we think that CCleaner is getting better and better by every program update. Did we mention that CCleaner got a auto update function? There is a new CCleaner release every month so remember to update CCleaner!
Cleaner is fast in use as long as you choose just to delete files, but if you choose the safe file deletion it takes much longer time, but this is normal as the files are overwritten several times. For normal users we would recommend just using the normal deletions method, but if you want your temp files to really be deleted, then go ahead, use the secure file deletion.
The registry cleaner part of CCleaner is not the best registry cleaner out there, but it’s good enough for a normal Windows user. Remember that this piece of software is free! Available in 35 different languages.
Pros:

• Freeware
• Easy in use
• Fast
• Doesn’t delete needed files/entries

Cons:

• Not the best registry cleaner

Source : http://software-today.com/ccleaner-review