Crni

I've been keeping only those 4 files since ever + WinApp2.ini I mostly use Custom Clean, sometime Registry Cleaner and extremely rarely these 3 tools: Uninstall (to delete an entry), System Restore (to delete a snapshot or two I don't care about), and Drive Wiper (to clean empty space and trigger MFT cleanup though not so much on SSDs anymore). I used CCEnhancer for a long time, but then I started adding my own tweaks and appending them to optimized WinApp2.ini. Then I got tired of doing it manually every time and made a batch file to automate some steps at least. Then I discovered WinApp2ool which had a lot of extra features.

Unfortunately, this still hasn't been resolved. The referenced topic was closed with this comment: Either this IS a bug and it was NOT intended for that file to be generated there, OR this IS a bug and that file should ALWAYS be generated to C:\Temp\UninstalItems.log as it "fails" to be generated if there is NO C:\Temp\ folder. This is happening even though both %TEMP% and %TMP% are pointing to the default %localappdata%\Temp which resolves to C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Temp\ and yet, this is NOT where this file gets generated. If the file is needed, it should be temporarily saved into %localappdata%\Temp and deleted after it's not needed anymore. It should not be saved into C:\Temp If this file is not needed, then the file probably shouldn't be saved anywhere, and any and all of its details can be held in memory. After a while going back to that tab would require refreshing its data anyway, so pulling outdated file would be useless anyway. So one way or another this is a bug.

Unfortunately, I found that if I let portable app automatically update itself it downloads the full version with all the other non-desired additional features and thus converting so called "portable" into definitively non-portable version, and it will certainly add all the noise into the Registry. Instead, I started letting portable app just notify my about the new version, and then manually download the new portable version and manually update the files. Someone else mentioned here doing the same for portable version, probably for the same reasons. Due to issues explained here I started preemptively checking registry and deleting any entries if they were added in the meantime which is how I found recently added "DataFolder" and "ProgramFolder" which are created even by the "portable" version.

I echo your concern as true portable app should NOT be creating anything inside registry or any files outside its portable folder. Just because something doesn't mandate use of an installer doesn't automatically make it portable. As I posted earlier, using CCleaner Portable for the first time on a new device will by default setup 50+ registry entries and will setup default configuration ignoring whatever is inside CCleaner.ini file that goes with portable instance. However, simply deleting everything from the registry and blocking access to "shepherd.ff.avast.com" is sufficient to prevent CCleaner Free Portable to add any of the problematic entries back into registry. If you have an advanced router you can do it there, or can add an entry to the firewall, or simply add this to your hosts file: 0.0.0.0 shepherd.ff.avast.com 0.0.0.0 shepherd.ff.avast.com Note: I have no CCleaner entries in Task Scheduler, and have nothing enabled under Privacy. It even works with enabled checks for new version, but keep in mind that if you enable automatic updates once updated it will replace Portable version with the Full version. I gave up on full or paid versions long time ago, so I'm not sure if above is also sufficient for those versions or if you have some Scheduled jobs enabled. I only tested it with the one for skipping UAC and it still works like a charm. Also, in my case even with portable version it will create DATA (with 6 more subfolders) and LOG subfolders which are empty, so it requires write permission in its folder which is another contradiction with what I consider true portable app that one can place on their thumb drive. I hope this will help some of you

What worked for me is either deleting "(Cfg)WelcomeScreen" from the registry or setting it to anything but "1", and blocking CCleaner from accessing "shepherd.ff.avast.com". This can be done either through hosts file, firewall, router... whatever works (or is easier) for you.

That's what I was missing I simply blocked shepherd.ff.avast.com in my hosts file and it only updates the "(Cfg)LastUpdate" with the current timestamp now, but doesn't add or modify anything else. This is all I have in registry now: Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Piriform\CCleaner] "AP"=dword:00000001 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Piriform\CCleaner] "DataFolder"="C:\\Program Files\\CCleaner\\" "ProgramFolder"="C:\\Program Files\\CCleaner\\" "(Cfg)LastUpdate"="07/14/2023 06:57:51 PM" If I delete "(Cfg)LastUpdate" it automatically gets added next time upon launch and if timestamp is 24h+ old then it gets updated with a failed attempt to get other values from the server. shepherd.ff.avast.com is an alias for shepherd-gcp.ff.avast.com. In addition, each time it launches it will make requests to www.ccleaner.com and ncc.avast.com which is an alias for ncc.avast.com.edgesuite.net and a1488.dscd.akamai.net. Too chatty for my taste and lacks some transparency as all available options are already disabled, so why would it need to connect to any of these servers if neither update checks nor data sharing or offers are enabled?

I got those with Process Monitor which only shows what DNS requests resolved to, but it would be a bit tricky to intercept the original request to the DNS, so that's why I posted these 3. The first 2 are the current endpoints for Akamai's CDN and those nodes are dynamically being added and removed as the traffic increases/decreases. Thus they might be short lived. The 3rd one points to Google's Cloud and is (but not limited) related to the update check. The CDN only pools static data.

Interesting observation @Tumasek. I found that deleting "(Cfg)WelcomeScreen" or setting to any value that is not "1" (i.e. "0", "2", "3", "true", "whatever") has the same effect and doesn't show the welcome screen until the value gets reverted back to "1" after a while. I tried it again using "3" as the value, but found it to make no difference. No later than 24h after "(Cfg)LastUpdate" timestamp CCleaner will make multiple requests to these servers: http://a23-220-246-23.deploy.static.akamaitechnologies.com http://a23-220-246-59.deploy.static.akamaitechnologies.com https://28.176.160.34.bc.googleusercontent.com As a result it will revert "(Cfg)WelcomeScreen" back to "1" and will (re)create any missing properties from the list I posted above. This happens regardless if Update check is enabled and no matter how Privacy section is configured. Even with everything disabled CCleaner still sends some data to the mother-ship and there was already a lot of noise about this over the last few years. I don't like any app sniffing on its own and uploading any data without my knowledge and explicit consent and am seriously considering to downgrade it down to a version before all this Avast bloatware was introduced, so at least v5 or maybe even v4. For now I've blocked CCleaner at the firewall and everything works "fine". I'm guessing there's some logic that determines all this (mis)behavior and there are other factors that influence it as not everyone is seeing the welcome screen at the same time, so it could be depending on the region, environment and/or something else. Thank you @Wisewiz. I had "DUGuid" in HKCU, but after deleting everything it never got recreated. "AP" is set to "1". I also don't have "StateSig" in HKLM and possibly had it before (should have made an export prior to deleting everything) and adding it with empty value made no difference. Even if we figure it out I'm afraid it would work only for a bit and then developers would change it and start annoying us again, or will introduce yet another feature we don't care about :( I thought I'll never say this, but after a very long support for every app and spreading Piriform love around me, I will look into Winapp2 alternatives as after all I just need a simple tool that will clean files and registry based on a list of rules. The only reason I haven't done that by now is because that list is updated according to what CCleaner does out-of-the-box and doesn't have redundant rules.

Thank you @Wisewiz. I thought @nukecad was more speculating what might be the reasoning behind welcome screen and the way it's being presented to various users. I'm getting fed up with wasting my time every once in a while with workarounds, so CCleaner's is out of my way :( I've also had major issues with CCleaner launch delay as it wants to connect to the mothership and doesn't handle gracefully timeout when blocked by firewall, and I don't care about its bloatware, so I didn't put any license and used CC Portable when it created those 51 entries in the registry, but no matter what I tried it never removes any of them. How did you manage to end up with only 4? Can you share which 4 you have?

There is definitely a bug in the latest release (v6.13.10517). It was driving me nuts when it was introduced months ago as I find zero value in that screen and it forces me to click more in order to get to where I want to be :( After searching I found a solution here and switching "(Cfg)WelcomeScreen" from 1 to 0 worked fine until the latest release. I'm always using CCleaner Free x64 Portable and soon after upgrading to the latest version the welcome screen popped back. I did the reg fix again, and it appeared to be working fine, but after a few launches of CCleaner it popped back again. After doing this several times I decided to delete everything Piriform related from the registry and deleted everything from the file system except CCleaner64.exe and portable.dat files... First launch and it populated registry with this junk: Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Piriform\CCleaner] "DataFolder"="C:\\Program Files\\CCleaner\\" "ProgramFolder"="C:\\Program Files\\CCleaner\\" "(Cfg)TTL"=" 86400" "(Cfg)TTL-Spread"=" 43200" "(Cfg)AU2"="1" "(Cfg)AlphaIntegration"="1" "(Cfg)AlphaMigration"="1" "(Cfg)ConfigEdgeChromiumCleaning"=" " "(Cfg)CountryCheckInterval"="7" "(Cfg)DriverScanInterval"="7" "(Cfg)DriverUpdater"="1" "(Cfg)DriverUpdaterComments"="0" "(Cfg)DriverUpdaterVersion"="1" "(Cfg)DumpReporting"="1" "(Cfg)GetIpmForTrial"="1" "(Cfg)HealthCheck"="1" "(Cfg)HealthCheckCommentsConfused"="10" "(Cfg)HealthCheckCommentsDislike"="10" "(Cfg)HealthCheckCommentsHate"="10" "(Cfg)HealthCheckCommentsLike"="10" "(Cfg)HealthCheckCommentsLove"="10" "(Cfg)HealthCheckCommentsOkay"="10" "(Cfg)HealthCheckIpm"="1" "(Cfg)HealthCheckShowEvent"="0" "(Cfg)HealthCheckVersion"="0" "(Cfg)HideEdgeChromium"="0" "(Cfg)PC"="0" "(Cfg)PE"="1" "(Cfg)PENP"="27" "(Cfg)PerformanceOptimizer"="1" "(Cfg)PerformanceOptimizerVersion"="1" "(Cfg)PrivacyPolicyDate"="2022-07-14" "(Cfg)QuickClean"="1" "(Cfg)QuickCleanIpm"="1" "(Cfg)REU"="90" "(Cfg)SPERDI"="8" "(Cfg)SRDI"="8" "(Cfg)ShowOffers3rdParty"="0" "(Cfg)ShowRenewButton"="1" "(Cfg)ShowRenewDialog"="1" "(Cfg)SoftwareUpdater"="1" "(Cfg)SoftwareUpdaterIpm"="1" "(Cfg)Survey-Uninstall"="false" "(Cfg)TrialOnboarding"="1" "(Cfg)VersionType"="Release" "(Cfg)WelcomeScreen"="1" "(Cfg)ABTestingNames"="|K7UY225RPXUXG25UNXUY6" "(Cfg)DTNP"="|GE3DANA" "(Cfg)DUNP"="|HE2DA" "(Cfg)HealthCheckIntroAB"="|IE" "(Cfg)LastUpdate"="07/12/2023 05:31:34 PM" What's up with all the likes and dislikes for HealthCheckComments? There are no comments or anything similar. Interestingly, the PrivacyPolicyDate is from the future :) and it just feels the last release was not tested enough and it obviously doesn't have full test coverage. So I changed again "(Cfg)WelcomeScreen" from 1 to 0 and it worked for a while, but then got reverted back. It would work fine for a while and then get reset back to 1. I tried launching CCleaner 20+ times in a row and it didn't flip it, so it doesn't look like it relates to the number of launches. Could be based on time elapsed since "(Cfg)LastUpdate"timestamp or something else, but it definitely is a bug because at some point it reverts the registry value to its default.

@nukecad, I think @HGVord provided a valid use case where this affects any user, regardless if they altered their firewall settings and it applies to any scenario when CCleaner cannot connect to any of those servers for various reasons - you're on the move and have no hotspot/internet connectivity, your ISP has some kind of outage and limited connectivity to the world, servers are inaccessible due to outage/maintenance/whatever... Any of these would affect all users. Let's not waste time debating if this is a bug or an oversight in a feature that was added several versions ago. What matters is if Avast will improve it for the sake of end users. I hope you're not suggesting we should all simply disable/uninstall firewalls just because apps are designed to connect to the internet and we should blindly trust developers because they know what's best for us. Developers are only humans and make all kind of mistakes which slip through QA and sometimes could be extremely dangerous. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Firewalls should be configured with block all for both incoming and outgoing connections. It could be overwhelming even for advanced users to selectively allow inbound and outbound connections which is why Windows blocks only incoming connections by default and is pretty wide open for outgoing ones. Many incoming connections would be automatically blocked by the router anyway because there's no port forwarding whereas personal data is leaking from the outbound connections.

Totally agree with @HGVord And let's be clear - CCleaner is NOT an antivirus, it does NOT have any definition updates and does NOT need any cloud based service in order for its core functionality to work for what it's designed for. The only reason it is connecting to multiple servers is to: Check if there is newer version available. Check serial number for Professional version - I'll take this for granted as I'm using FREE version so there's no need to check Pro Key when it's not present. Upload user data - again, let's assume that disabling this option under Privacy settings actually work. Pull marketing data about promos and offers to upgrade to Professional version. None of these are essential and disabling internet access does NOT affect core functionality and it is poor design that causes significant delays - developers tried really hard to connect to the mother ship by contacting various servers to achieve the same non-essential thing which is to bother users with nagging screens and notifications. Not once, not twice, but EVERY single time CCleaner is launched it has to show annoying notification popup. If user chose NOT to upgrade there is a reason for that and why bother again and again? But they didn't bother to properly handle exceptions and therefore extremely long connection timeouts - this is the culprit of those long delays. And for those conspiracy theorists, do you remember this embarrassment: https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/18/16325202/ccleaner-hack-malware-security If it was Open Source I would be able to verify those claims but being closed source I don't trust that the app ONLY pulls anonymous data just because someone who can't even control their source code said so. I'm in US and only use legal software but am blocking many apps from having internet access and am limiting their access to files and other resources. As far as Facebook, Google and other big brothers go, they were all caught numerous times for stealing various personal data so please spare me these arguments.

Every single version since 5.65.7632 takes forever to start and exit including just released 5.68.7820. It appears it ignores Privacy Settings and is stubborn attempting to connect to various remote servers both during launch and exit, Every time it launches it keeps bugging users with annoying adds which is why I had to block it with the firewall. I've been using CCleaner for a very long time for cleaning various junk but it started to behave like one with all the bloatware that was added since takeover

This is confirmed in 2.16.809: - 32-bit on XP Pro - 64-bit on Windows 7 Home - 64-bit on Windows 7 Pro In addition, "Defrag progress" popup dialog is modal which prohibits switching tabs and is also triggering this behavior. I missed this one and have created another bug report here: http://forum.piriform.com/index.php?showtopic=39694 The previous version didn't have any of these issues.

It's a minor, but for me an annoying bug: While defragmenting it shows "Defrag progress" popup which is now modal and therefore prohibits change of tabs in the background. This used to work just fine for a long time. I usually defrag files only, and as I cannot scroll up/down in the file list, I switch to the drive tab, so I can see more detailed progress of how many files and fragments are left to be defragged, but with the most recent version that's not possible anymore. Furthermore, I'd love to be able to change any tabs and scroll the list while any message dialog is popped up.

I've seen this happening on different drives, and when you click on the non-blue blocks it clearly indicates there are fragmented files, but analysis report shows all zeros. This happens without any limitation and with default configuration. Trying custom settings didn't help.

I'm having the same issue with Windows re-indexing everything after each boot. I have disabled MS Search, and MS Search More*, but something is still interfering with indexing. I tried disabling Saved Search Folders* and Windows Search Logs*, but that didn't help I checked all settings inside Registry and everything looks OK. If I don't use CCleaner everything works fine, but after I run it Windows will start rebuilding index cache as soon as I reboot. In the meantime Outlook will keep complaining about search being disabled and items not being indexed. I assume something else that doesn't have such obvious name is responsible for deleting something that Windows Search relies on. What else can cause rebuilding search index?

Interesting. So it's not just my box. I though initially something is messed up, but only Piriform's installer was opening it in Chrome, so I wasn't sure and wanted to ask if there's something special about how it's opening URL and though it might be related to chromeHTML as that one is specific to Chrome and is the only one assigned to Chrome in my class root.

You mean "Save all settings to INI file" option?It was easier to dump the whole reg. key and re-import Anyway, this did resolve the problem, and it appears there was bunch of other keys as it was installed for all users and most of them got deleted after uninstall. However, I noticed a weird issue with installer as the offered option to open readme.html opened it in Chrome! Chrome was not assigned to any file or protocol, and all URLs and HTML pages are opened in the default browser except for Piriform's installer. Is it using chromeHTML:// URI handler or something else? This is the only case when a web page starts my Chrome which I rarely use so that's why it doesn't have any file/content/protocol assignments.

That's great. It would also be great if Cleaner tab would also have checkboxes as in Registry tab, or at least an option to have multiple items selected with Ctrl/Shift click. Sometimes I get a very long list and for some reason want to delete only certain items. It may be annoying to manually disable bunch of them, scan, delete, re-enable again. The alternative is to scan, delete only one, re-scan, delete 2nd, re-scan, delete 3rd... With multiple items selection I would be able to immediately pick only those 3-4 that I want to delete without need to change my default settings. For example, it forces me to close Firefox while cleaning and maybe I want to clean everything else except Firefox entries as I can't or don't want to close it right now, but I do want to delete everything else.

I wasn't sure if it was intentional either, so that's why I'm not claiming it's a bug. And even if it was intentional would like either to be reverted back or to have an option to choose between the 2

Will try that, but have to export bunch of custom imports first Though, if that works then it relies on the value of this key: [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Piriform\CCleaner] @="C:\\Program Files (x86)\\CCleaner" Thanks

I'm not sure I understand the "problem" Why don't you just hit "Analyze" button again once cleaning/analysis is done? Same for "Scan for issues" under Registry tab. Though, it would be nice to have some kind of Refresh button under Tools as F5 is not obvious.

Yeah, you're right, but again it may offer an option to automate that process (i.e. a confirmation popup "Do you want to restart Explorer.exe process?")

Searched older post, but couldn't find this one, so I apologize if someone already reported it. CCleaner x64 gets installed into Program Files (x86) instead into Program Files. Even if manually changing this, on the next update it will still want to install to the wrong one. Defraggler installer however does this correctly so it seems to be CCleaner setup specific and it doesn't detect properly x86 vs. x64. It would also be nice if it can detect existing version and its folder. BTW why is it always installing both 32bit and 64bit?