Is a freeware really better than a pay to use program?

since the beggining, when my computer crashed my technician installed CCleaner in my computer so i stared using....

but then i realized there was this other program (windows washer) which was a pay to use program... so i decided to download it from a torrent and use it, everything worked perfectly.

But after a while, i decided to use and it told me that there was a new version 1.42 or somethng like that so i download it, so i decided to test both products, first I cleaned everything i could with windows washer, then after it told me there was nothing else to clean i used CCleaner and there was still around 22MB to clean....

so i came to a conclusion that maybe freeware is better after all?

btw anyone know a better anti virus than Kaspersky?

feel free to post you opinions

I have tried many cleaning programs (I had Windows Washer before I found CCleaner). I found CCleaner to have the easiest and neatest GUI, plus other options (easy access to them). Plus, it's very easy to add more cleaning items yourself.

I have been with CCleaner for over a year, I joined the team knowing CCleaner would be something big. I wasn't wrong, it's getting bigger and bigger with every new release.

You will find in many cases freeware or open source can be better than shareware. But when it comes to productivity programs, you have to buy. Like Adobe Photoshop CS2/CS3, Flash MX, Maya 3D, and so on....

Kaspersky is a very good anti-virus, but personal Anti-Vir is the best AV I have ever had. I have Anti-Vir PE Premium and ClamWin.

so i decided to download it from a torrent and use it

This forum generally is much against piracy and stealing of applications, so be careful exactly what you state in future posts. ;)

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Many commercial cleaning programs don't offer anything that CCleaner doesn't, and in many cases they don't even clean nearly as much as CCleaner and many of them aren't expandable such as CCleaner is via the winapp2.ini add-on.

Kaspersky is a very good anti-virus, but personal Anti-Vir is the best AV I have ever had. I have Anti-Vir PE Premium and ClamWin.

While Avira is a very good product, there have been numerous reports regarding its cleaning ability. It seems that it can detect certain malware but cannot clean then. I say go with Kaspersky and you won't be disappointed. Version 7 is awesome. Plus, you have the option of scanning encrypted ports, SSL, which is something I have not seem is any other product.

Just uninstalled Antivir free, installed AVG free, going to give it a try. Many false positives from Antivir. Maybe it was the way I had it configured, but if another program moved, opened or just touched one of the false positives, such as the one associated w/ CCleaner, Antivir would stop everything 'till I told it to ignore the false positive. So I had to babysit it while it ran.

FYI. :)