A Better Uninstaller?

Posted on July 7th, 2008 by Jason

At a rough guess I would say that around 50 percent of PC problems are concerned one way or another with installing and uninstalling software, the latter being far and away the most troublesome operation for many users. A lot of programs are just not very good at removing themselves from systems, bits and pieces are often left behind, cluttering the Registry or interfering with other programs.

Contrary to popular belief Add/Remove Programs in Windows doesn’t actually do any uninstalling, it’s simply groups together the uninstall utilities for the programs on your PC so maybe it’s time for something with a bit more teeth. How about Revo Uninstaller, it’s a powerful uninstaller utility that takes over where Add/Remove Programs leaves off. Firstly it analyses the program, checking files folders and Registry keys, then it sets a new Restore Point and then, only when it is satisfied that it knows everything there is to know about a program, does it remove all traces of it. It should even work on programs that won’t uninstall by conventional means, or simply refuse to go away. There’s also an advanced Hunter mode for uninstalling and managing programs that start automatically, so if you’ve got a blockage or unwelcome guest on your PC, this might just be what you need to get rid of it.

Tags: problem, program, registry, remove, restore, Software, system, Uninstall, uninstall utilities, Uninstaller, uninstalling software, utility, Windows

This entry was posted on Monday, July 7th, 2008 at 4:57 pm and is filed under Computer, Software. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

2 Responses to “A Better Uninstaller?”

Ike on 15 May 2009 at 7:43 am #

Well – it couldn’t handle the NERO 9 package.
That was the Ultimate test for me.

I was left with almost everything and had to remove tons of stuff manually. (keys, dirs, service,logs etc).

In short – don’t bother. It sucks.
It really does.
Ike
J.R. on 16 Aug 2009 at 6:58 pm #

Ike,
Sorry you had problems with Revo Uninstaller. It is the ULTIMATE uninstaller for me. I do a lot of software evaluations on my main machine, and I have a ton of stuff. Currently, Secunia Personal Software Inspector tells me I have about 600 apps on my machine. (Of course, I have lots of room too, I’m spinning almost 3 TiB of local storage. Of all those programs, 50+ are in my weekly working set, another 150 or so are use at least monthly, and another 200 could be used, even daily, depending on what development project I may be on. The least used programs have been used a couple of times, at a minimum, so they stay on the system.
Stuff I try and which doesn’t do what I want or has “issues” gets uninstalled almost immediately, usually with Revo. Works great for me.
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Nero can be hard to deal with, because it hooks itself in to so many places. Nero *does* offer its own cleanup programs, have you tried them?
Lastly, you might want to check the ACL’s on your problem programs. Incorrectly set ACL’s can really screw lots of things up, besides uninstalls.
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Just my $0.02 worth.
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J.R.