Welcome back to CCleaner Professional ???

Thanks for the heads-up. Of course, if it comes to either or both of my daily-use PCs, it will smack me right in the face (ouch!), so the heads-up will be somewhat redundant.

I really appreciate your continuing participation in this discussion, and your sharing of your viewpoint earlier today. And @hazelnut, I'm glad that a member of the "power group" agrees with my stand on this.

I'm going to launch a complaint with Support if the danged thing comes back up on my machines. First, I guess, I'll try the registry fix. Speaking of which, I noticed this morning that the number of lines in the CCleaner keys in my registry for both HKCU and HKLM is greatly reduced. Hmmm. Will it stay that way? Could it be that the "All settings in .ini file" Advanced Settings is now working?

Just re-checked, and after using CC twice today and re-starting once, those keys remain sparsely populated. Interesting. ?‍♂️

I'm not going to start a new thread on this, because it's not a Bug, and I don't need Help with it, but this registry thing is really interesting. In HKLM, where there were about 40-50 lines (IIRC), I'm down to 4 (FOUR!). None of the old Cfg stuff is there. If this is a change with the latest update, I welcome it.

(Until/unless the Welcome screen comes back and there's no registry setting to change from 1 to 0.)

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 :(

A</span>fter 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.

@Crni:

It's no bug. See the above posts from @nukecad. The developers intend that the Welcome screen be seen, eventually by (almost?) everybody.

Re: the registry. I have three licenses, but I always use the Portable, because it offers everything I need, and it promises not to use the registry for its settings.

Any way, long story short, I got fed up with CC taking 10-15 seconds to open after my click. That only happened in the versions (old and new) when I entered my license key. Never happened in installed-Free or in not-"installed"-portable, unless I entered my key.

I, too, wiped the registry, where HKLM Piriform>CCleaner was the offending 40-entry monster, put back a new CC Portable, did not enter my key (even though the ghost of it shows in Options>License Key), and this time, my registry shows only four lines (always ignoring Default:value not set) in HKLM and only two in HKCU. And I have yet to see that da**ed screen on either of my daily active machines.

Maybe only licensed-registered copies are getting the screen? Note that if you enter your key into either the Portable or the Free version, you'll get Professional at the top of your window, and the Welcome pest can return.

17 hours ago, Wisewiz said:
<div class="ipsQuote_contents">
	<p>
		<a contenteditable="false" data-ipshover="" data-ipshover-target="<___base_url___>/profile/58138-crni/?do=hovercard" data-mentionid="58138" href="<___base_url___>/profile/58138-crni/" rel="">@Crni</a>:
	</p>

	<p>
		It's no bug. See the above posts from <a contenteditable="false" data-ipshover="" data-ipshover-target="<___base_url___>/profile/73689-nukecad/?do=hovercard" data-mentionid="73689" href="<___base_url___>/profile/73689-nukecad/" rel="">@nukecad</a>. The developers intend that the Welcome screen be seen, eventually by (almost?) everybody.
	</p>

	<p>
		Re: the registry. I have three licenses, but I always use the Portable, because it offers everything I need, and it promises not to use the registry for its settings.
	</p>

	<p>
		Any way, long story short, I got fed up with CC taking 10-15 seconds to open after my click. That only happened in the versions (old and new) when I entered my license key. Never happened in installed-Free or in not-"installed"-portable, unless I entered my key.
	</p>

	<p>
		I, too, wiped the registry, where HKLM Piriform&gt;CCleaner was the offending 40-entry monster, put back a new CC Portable, did not enter my key (even though the ghost of it shows in Options&gt;License Key), and this time, my registry shows only four lines (always ignoring Default:value not set) in HKLM and only two in HKCU. And I have yet to see that da**ed screen on either of my daily active machines.
	</p>

	<p>
		Maybe only licensed-registered copies are getting the screen? Note that if you enter your key into either the Portable or the Free version, you'll get Professional at the top of your window, and the Welcome pest can return.
	</p>
</div>

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 <span>:(</span>

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?

I may just have found a possible permanent solution to the WelcomeScreen appearing in the installed version happening all the time or in some cases spasmodically. Looking back at the solutions recommended in this forum topic I first went to the registry at HKLM\Software\Piriform\CCleaner and as suggested by previous forum users I modified the item (Cfg)WelcomeScreen to "0" (it was indeed showing the default of "1").

I then opened CCleaner and under "Options" unticked the boxes in both "Smart Cleaning" and "Updates". Then under "Advanced" I ticked the box for "Save all settings to INI file".

As reported by previous forum members, the changing of the registry value to "0", does result in the Welcome Screen not appearing. "Great" I thought, but after a while my set value of"0" just kept reverting back to the default of "1" for no apparent reason, and of course the Welcome Screen then continued to return.

I said some rude words to myself and the computer at this juncture, but decided to experiment further. I have now found that putting the value to "3" instead of "0" has just the same effect of stopping the Welcome Screen, as putting it to "0". But furthermore this value of "3" has not been somehow reverting to "1" as it did after modifying the value to "0". So far, after many days now, I have not had the Welcome Screen showing, and the registry value that I set at "3" has remained at "3" now all the time and thus I no longer see any WelcomeScreen. I just trust that this actually turns out to be a permanent solution.

Hope this helps anyone who was having the same problems - it's now working fine for me, although I do suspect a future update may affect it again. Hence my turning off "Smart Cleaning" and "Updates".

Incidentally, just in passing, the problem does not happen in any case in the "Portable" version.

1 hour ago, Crni said:
<div class="ipsQuote_contents">
	<p>
		How did you manage to end up with only 4? Can you share which 4 you have?
	</p>
</div>

No problem. First shot is HKLM; second is HKCU.

I'm guessing that what has been successful so far for me is this: I uninstalled/deleted CC completely, removing all bits of it from the AppData folder as well as the program folder; deleted the HKCU and HKLM Piriform keys completely. Installed (well, you know ...) the Portable CC on my D:\ drive with my other portables, and most importantly, did not enter my license key. I still have all of the features I use, and the registry has only populated with the entries you see for the past couple of weeks at least. Piriform is in both hives, and CCleaner is a subkey for each Piriform, but what you see is what I've got.

Clipboard03.jpg

Clipboard04.jpg

@Tumasek: Thank you for that brave suggestion. Please let us know if the 3 changes to 1 at any time soon, will you?

Meanwhile, I f my registry gets populated again, I'll try the 3.

1 hour ago, Tumasek said:
<div class="ipsQuote_contents">
	<p>
		Incidentally, just in passing, the problem does not happen in any case in the "Portable" version.
	</p>
</div>

Unless, of course, you enter your license key. Then Portable morphs into Professional, and it's baaaaack!

23 hours ago, Tumasek said:
<div class="ipsQuote_contents">
	<p>
		I may just have found a possible permanent solution to the WelcomeScreen appearing in the installed version happening all the time or in some cases spasmodically. Looking back at the solutions recommended in this forum topic I first went to the registry at HKLM\Software\Piriform\CCleaner and as suggested by previous forum users I modified the item (Cfg)WelcomeScreen to "0" (it was indeed showing the default of "1"). 
	</p>

	<p>
		I then opened CCleaner and under "Options" unticked the boxes in both "Smart Cleaning" and "Updates". Then under "Advanced" I ticked the box for "Save all settings to INI file".
	</p>

	<p>
		As reported by previous forum members, the changing of the registry value to "0", does result in the Welcome Screen not appearing. "Great" I thought, but after a while my set value of"0" just kept reverting back to the default of "1" for no apparent reason, and of course the Welcome Screen then continued to return. 
	</p>

	<p>
		I said some rude words to myself and the computer at this juncture, but decided to experiment further. I have now found that putting the value to "3" instead of "0" has just the same effect of stopping the Welcome Screen, as putting it to "0". But furthermore this value of "3" has not been somehow reverting to "1" as it did after modifying the value to "0". So far, after many days now, I have not had the Welcome Screen showing, and the registry value that I set at "3" has remained at "3" now all the time and thus I no longer see any WelcomeScreen. I just trust that this actually turns out to be a permanent solution.
	</p>

	<p>
		Hope this helps anyone who was having the same problems - it's now working fine for me, although I do suspect a future update may affect it again. Hence my turning off "Smart Cleaning" and "Updates".
	</p>

	<p>
		Incidentally, just in passing, the problem does not happen in any case in the "Portable" version.
	</p>

	<p>
		 
	</p>
</div>

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.

22 hours ago, Wisewiz said:
<div class="ipsQuote_contents">
	<p>
		No problem. First shot is HKLM; second is HKCU.
	</p>

	<p>
		I'm guessing that what has been successful so far for me is this: I uninstalled/deleted CC completely, removing all bits of it from the AppData folder as well as the program folder; deleted the HKCU and HKLM Piriform keys completely. Installed (well, you know ...) the Portable CC on my D:\ drive with my other portables, and most importantly, <em>did not enter my license key</em>. I still have all of the features I use, and the registry has only populated with the entries you see for the past  couple of weeks at least. Piriform is in both hives, and CCleaner is a subkey for each Piriform, but what you see is what I've got.
	</p>

	<p>
		<a class="ipsAttachLink ipsAttachLink_image" data-fileid="17663" href="<fileStore.core_Attachment>/monthly_2023_07/Clipboard03.jpg.cdcd460ba0f408b2c402233190ef2377.jpg" data-fileext="jpg" rel=""><img alt="Clipboard03.jpg" class="ipsImage ipsImage_thumbnailed" data-fileid="17663" data-ratio="127.7" width="148" src="<fileStore.core_Attachment>/monthly_2023_07/Clipboard03.jpg.cdcd460ba0f408b2c402233190ef2377.jpg" /></a>
	</p>

	<p>
		<a class="ipsAttachLink ipsAttachLink_image" data-fileid="17664" href="<fileStore.core_Attachment>/monthly_2023_07/Clipboard04.jpg.d88dd82ab2b0054fa413efafb1b97fcd.jpg" data-fileext="jpg" rel=""><img alt="Clipboard04.jpg" class="ipsImage ipsImage_thumbnailed" data-fileid="17664" data-ratio="120.69" width="116" src="<fileStore.core_Attachment>/monthly_2023_07/Clipboard04.jpg.d88dd82ab2b0054fa413efafb1b97fcd.jpg" /></a>
	</p>
</div>

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.

@Crni

Re: your list of three servers above: I wonder whether it will work if I block all of those in hosts.

Interesting.

The first 2 show as invalid URL's

http://a23-220-246-23.deploy.static.akamaitechnologies.com
http://a23-220-246-59.deploy.static.akamaitechnologies.com

and

https://28.176.160.34.bc.googleusercontent.com

shows

Your connection is not private

Attackers might be trying to steal your information from 28.176.160.34.bc.googleusercontent.com (for example, passwords, messages, or credit cards). Learn more


NET::ERR_CERT_COMMON_NAME_INVALID


Subject: shepherd.ff.avast.com

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.

I've blocked all three in my hosts file, and will watch to see whether CC cries "foul" in one way or another. My browser is Chrome, not FF. FF evidently ignores the hosts file, so maybe, by extension, TB does, too. I'm not sure how that works.

My hosts now:

# Copyright (c) 1993-2009 Microsoft Corp.

0.0.0.0 ncc.avast.com


0.0.0.0 ncc.avast.com.edgesuite.net


0.0.0.0 ipm-provider.ff.avast.com


0.0.0.0 shepherd.ff.avast.com


0.0.0.0 ip-info.ff.avast.com


0.0.0.0 analytics.ff.avast.com


0.0.0.0 a23-220-246-23.deploy.static.akamaitechnologies.com


0.0.0.0 a23-220-246-59.deploy.static.akamaitechnologies.com


0.0.0.0 28.176.160.34.bc.googleusercontent.com

All because of CCleaner's behavior. Maybe superfluous, I dunno.

22 minutes ago, Wisewiz said:
<div class="ipsQuote_contents">
	<p>
		0.0.0.0 ncc.avast.com
	</p>

	<p>
		0.0.0.0 ncc.avast.com.edgesuite.net


		0.0.0.0 ipm-provider.ff.avast.com


		0.0.0.0 shepherd.ff.avast.com


		0.0.0.0 ip-info.ff.avast.com


		0.0.0.0 analytics.ff.avast.com
	</p>
</div>

? 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? <span class="ipsEmoji">?</span></p>
10 minutes ago, Crni said:
<div class="ipsQuote_contents">
	<p>
		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? <span class="ipsEmoji">?</span></p>
</div>

Now that is the 64-dollar question! If you ever discover the answer, please share it here.

7 hours ago, Wisewiz said:
<div class="ipsQuote_contents">
	<p>
		FF evidently ignores the hosts file
	</p>
</div>

if you use "secure DNS," that bypasses the HOSTS file. that is why i don't use "secure DNS."

if google-chrome is set to use "secure DNS," it also will bypass the HOSTS file.

if you don't want your HOSTS file to be bypassed, don't use "secure DNS."

@redwolfe_98

Thanks for the reminder. I don't. My DNS server is public and fast, but not anything like "secure."

1 hour ago, Wisewiz said:
<div class="ipsQuote_contents">
	<p>
		I don't. My DNS server is public and fast, but not anything like "secure."
	</p>
</div>

if firefox is bypassing your HOSTS file it is because you have it set to use "secure DNS," also known as "DNS over HTTPS" (DoH).

here is some information about how to disable firefox's "secure DNS," also known as "DNS over HTTPS" (DoH):

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/dns-over-https#w_configure-doh-protection-settings

here is a website where you can test to see which DNS servers your browser is using:

https://www.dnsleaktest.com/results.html

i use "quad9" for my DNS servers:

https://www.quad9.net/

i use "example.com" to test to see if my HOSTS file is being used properly. of course, "example.com" is included in my HOSTS file.

i use the "steven black" HOSTS file (including porn extensions), along with my own custom HOSTS file, merged together:

https://github.com/StevenBlack/hosts

to add to what i was saying, because i use a large HOSTS file, i disable the "DNS cache service," something that is carried over from when i used windows XP. to do that, in windows "registry," i go to:

"HKLM/system/currentcontrolset/services/dnscache" and set the "start" dword-value to "4," to disable the service.

with windows xp, you needed to disable the "DNS cache service" when using a large HOSTS file. i don't know if that is required, with windows 10, but i assume that it is.