An old friend let me down...hard!

CCleaner for Windows
1

We've been friends for a long time. You've always been there for me. I've recommended you to hundreds, if not thousands of people but I'm afraid this is where we part ways.

Yesterday I was almost done fixing a customers computer. The very last step for me is to run CCleaner in the default configuration (except for the "Delete files older than 48 hours bit). I check one more time to see that the machine still gets on line, Internet Explorer still works and the Office software works and then I call it a day.

After running CCleaner I opened Internet Explorer and...a blank page. Firefox worked but Internet Explorer 7 and Microsoft Updates would not. I installed the Firefox Windows Update plug-in and I could access Microsoft Updates but it would not function. The funny thing is Microsoft Updates opened in Internet Explorer. At that time, I was in the owner's house working on the machine but when that happened, I brought it home to work on it.

Tonight, after a few hours trying a bajillion things, including installing Internet Explorer 8 (no go), I ended up doing a repair install of the operating system. After five hours of installing all the updates and constantly restarting the machine, everything was just fine.

Understand, at this point I had no idea that CCleaner was the culprit. I have always maintained that CCleaner is the only clean up program I have ever used that has NEVER caused a problem.

So, everything is good and I run CCleaner again. BAM! The same thing happens. Then it sinks in. CCleaner just screwed up six hours of work. Even System Restore doesn't help.

So now, I get to start ALL over. Great.

Someone once said to me "Even if you eat in the best restaurant in town, sooner or later, you will get a bad meal".

I think I bitch slapped him.

And before some smart ass asks, no, I did NOT back stuff up. I did for the first year of using CCleaner and I never needed it so I quit doing it.

s**t! I wish I drank.

2

If you decide to have a drink, I'd recommend an elderflower martini. Does the job pleasantly, smoothly, and rapidly. When made with good quality ingredients, will leave little or no hangover.

3

Hi bonyolddoc, and welcome to the forum.

I'm really sad to hear the problems that have apparently been caused by CCleaner. Out of all the millions of people who run it without any problems, including myself, it's still a real concern when someone suddenly hits a major issue.

I gather from your post that you have experience and knowledge, and I'm sure if you had any idea as to exactly what had caused the issue, you would have informed us.

We would obviously rather solve a problem than have a user move away from CCleaner to some alternative product, where you could be moving from the frying pan into the fire.

I wonder if this is something that could have been caused purely because you have upgraded to the latest version. If so, moving back to a version which previously ran sweetly without any problems may be a better alternative than moving to something else.

Obviously, because CCleaner is a free product there isn't any ulterior motive behind this suggestion. I'm just reading into your post that CCleaner has been a good friend, and I'm sure you would prefer to go on using it.

Finally, is there any clue as to what happened? Was there any error messages evident? Was there anything different in the software you installed on this PC, maybe a newer version of something, or different drivers?

Anything really that could give us a clue as to what happened.

If you decide on a previous version, they are available from FileHippo. Hope this helps.

CCleaner Versions:

4

It's always difficult to comprehend an application that runs with no problems for many people (incl me) and then suddenly screws some pc up.

I think it's reasonable to say that CC, whatever version, does not commonly or routinely screw anything up. I would guess that there's one particular thing or combination of things being shafted that's causing the problem: 'Internet Explorer and...a blank page. Firefox worked but Internet Explorer 7 and Microsoft Updates would not' is not a catastrophic failure, but identifying and fixing it is.

Alright, what O/S, etc. Did you run CC Cleaner or Registry clean, or both? What does IE would not work mean?

5
It's always difficult to comprehend an application that runs with no problems for many people (incl me) and then suddenly screws some pc up.

I think it's reasonable to say that CC, whatever version, does not commonly or routinely screw anything up. I would guess that there's one particular thing or combination of things being shafted that's causing the problem: 'Internet Explorer and...a blank page. Firefox worked but Internet Explorer 7 and Microsoft Updates would not' is not a catastrophic failure, but identifying and fixing it is.

Alright, what O/S, etc. Did you run CC Cleaner or Registry clean, or both? What does IE would not work mean?

The reason I was called to the job was that someone had downloaded winantivir2009. Of course by the time I was called, it had done some pretty ugly things. I was thinking that as that particular nasty has some capability to alter the registry, could it have altered them in such a fashion as to lead CCleaner into believing they were orphaned registry entries?

I've used CCleaner for so long with out a single problem I just can't toss it aside over one little incident. I'll cool down for a day or so and give it another chance. You can bet your sweet tahootey I'm backing up from now on. I'm not entirely certain what good that will do but but I won't skip it any more.

It was actually the register cleaner that did the dastardly deed. I should have known something was wrong when it found 5000 errors on an operating system that I had just cleaned up. So much faith I had in CCleaner that I looked at the results, shrugged and let her fly. The second sweep found 3000. By then I was getting nervous but I let her fly again. The third time, when you would expect to see one, it found 1000. Now, I was pretty sure I had just hosed the operating system.

Yeah, sure enough, not ten minutes after I had told the customer how safe CCleaner was, IE7 shows that it is connected to the website but no website was displaying. SFC /scannow had no effect. System restore had no effect. flushdns did nothing. Totally cleaning out manually all the things that CCleaner usually does did nothing.

I wasn't going to waste anymore time so I just took it home and ran a repair on the operating system.

When I was all done, with my heart in my throat, I did it again. CCleaner did it again, too.

I have used CCleaner exclusively for a few years now. I'm going to stick with it but I'm sure going to watch a lot more closely.

No, I didn't do any forensics on it. I should have, I know, but all I really wanted to do was get the machine off my bench and get paid.

What the heck is an elderflower martini? To tell you the truth, in the bars I used to hang out in, I'd be scared to order an elderflower martini. I saw the bartender burn holes through a guy's head with just a look for ordering a Grasshopper.

6

So. Registry cleaners, eh? Mixed with malware.

You hosed the registry. (Well, you and the malware.) Not Ccleaner, it was you. YOU!

To relieve the ensuing guilt and embarrassment,

Take 2 parts of Bombay Sapphire or Tanquery Gin.

1 part of Noilly Prat dry Vermouth

1/2 part of Elderflower Cordial.

Shake together with a big handful of ice (preferably chipped from a melting glacier or iceberg, or at least made from filtered tap water) and pour into a martini glass.

The colour will be pale gold; there will be a hint of effervescence.

(BTW, my gay friends aren't into this, much. Don't know why.)

Drink. Delicious. Your brain will feel like the recently-hosed registry has just been restored. But better, and brighter.

Resist the urge to have more than 2.

[edit] might be best not to order this at a redneck bar.

7

bonyolddoc, winantivir2009 is from the antivirus2009 gang and is a bit of nasty work.

On a non-infected system download Malwarebytes MBAM:

http://www.malwarebytes.org/mbam.php

This infection is so nasty that the latest versions are built to detect MBAM and cripple it so you need to install it on a Flash drive or burn it to a CD after renaming it to bonyremove.exe or something like that so that it is not detected then install it on the infected system then do an Update and run a Quick scan then let it remove whatever it finds and a reboot is probably required to remove locked files.

Also see:

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/malware-re...ivirus-vista-xp

8
bonyolddoc, winantivir2009 is from the antivirus2009 gang and is a bit of nasty work.

On a non-infected system download Malwarebytes MBAM:

http://www.malwarebytes.org/mbam.php

This infection is so nasty that the latest versions are built to detect MBAM and cripple it so you need to install it on a Flash drive or burn it to a CD after renaming it to bonyremove.exe or something like that so that it is not detected then install it on the infected system then do an Update and run a Quick scan then let it remove whatever it finds and a reboot is probably required to remove locked files.

Also see:

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/malware-re...ivirus-vista-xp

If you feel you have still problems from antivirus2009, please post in the spyware hell part of our forum here.

http://forum.piriform.com/index.php?showforum=12

9
The reason I was called to the job was that someone had downloaded winantivir2009.

Why on earth didn't you mention that in your first post? ;)