Stephen Jenkins

Would like to be able to temporarily disable the Exclude settings, ie for a quick quick defrag (super quick) I want to exclude these files and folders, but for a normal quick defrag I would like to defrag the files in the exclude list as well. At the moment I seem to have to keep rebuilding and deleting the list, depending on the amount of defragging I want to do

That's really the point of my request in the first place. I clean up all of the startups to get a reasonably small number. Then I add or update programs and the list just grows again (Adobe adds a quick starter every time I upgrade, Java add something to check for updates and so on). Now I know that I don't want any of these things and simply remove them. They are fairly obvious - I can tell by the name. But others are not so obvious - so I do some research, and get rid of what I know I don't want. What I would also like to be able to do is annotate those that I want to keep - to say whether definitely keep it (if I know that it is important to my system) or to hold it in abeyance for review if I have a problem with a system later. Maybe I am being unduly cautious - but I know that if I take this approach I will minimise the risk of problems whilst getting quite a smooth startup. The total number of enabled items is 17: they include Antivirus, Firewall, Newsreader, etc. So they are more than useful - they are essential. Some of the others I could possibly remove - but the comments feature would definitely assist. Of course I could just take a screen shot (there is no export feature in CCleaner) and make some notes in a text document, but if comments could be added in CCleaner itself, this seems to be the ideal solution.

I'm glad my idea has had a favourable reception in the last couple of posts. The number of startup items may seem to you quite large - I have pruned a couple more things out this morning. But my list does seem to keep growing as I add new programs (maybe other people don't have this problem). Also, when I go to help other people sort out their computers which are in a mess - their lists are so long that my list is positively petite by comparison. Thanks

First - the screen shot you produced is EXACTLY what I want (assuming that I can type whatever I want into the comment field) Second - the number of entries I have in my startup group is 31 - not very many - of which 12 are currently disabled. There are some entries which I have temporarily disabled (ie they provide functionality which I will need at some stage, but not currently - eg Daemon tools, for ISO images - I use it only occasionally at the moment, so don't need it to be preloaded - at other times I use it a lot so it is handy to have it start automatically.) Other entries I have disabled for other reasons, where the trusted sites have said that they are probably not necessary (but not definitely unnecessary) so I have left them in for the time being - as disabled - by way of backup. But the Third point is this: in your example you have NvCplDaemon. You have decided to keep this. But why have you so decided? In three months time, when your list has been extended and you have installed several more applications, you won't know which items relate to new applications, and which you have decided to keep permanently. So, unless you have a good memory, you would have to search for NvCplDaemon again, to find out if it was something new - which could be removed - or something that you had already reviewed and wanted to keep permanently. So I am simply suggesting that being able to apply a short comment - like "Keep - Sound card" would help speed up the process of reviewing the list.

Perhaps I didn't really make myself clear enough. Like most people I have lots and lots of items in the startup group. I go through the list on the internet, as in your Google search, and then disable the ones I don't want. Weeks later, after other applications have been added, I go through the whole list again to disable things I don't need - but I have to check everything that is enabled, because I can't remember what most things do, whereas if I had been able to put a note by things, I would only have to check the items without notes. Similarly, as in the RealTek example, if I had only one item disabled, it would be easy to check. But as I have lots of items disabled, in order to find out which one applies to the sound card, I would have to recheck every single disabled item. A notes field would help save the effort of keep having to recheck on Google.

On the Tools|Startup pane [where I can enable or disable programs] it would be to great to be able to include text notes or hyperlinks to web sites so that I could keep track of all the research that I have done in finding out what each of these programs does, and why I have removed it. For example, today I disabled RTHDCPL.EXE - but it is not apparent from that name alone that this is associated with my RealTek sound card, and so that if I later get problems with my sound card that is all I need to re-enable.