CCleaner Screwed Up My Computer

[Daisuke]

I did a clean up and I also cleaned up my registry and this is the first time it has made a big problem.

 

When I did the registry clean up it would not let me delete any programs because it kept saying they are in use and I cannot go to Add/Remove Programs because it is not there anymore in the Control Panel and I cannot do a System Restore now either. I also cannot find the so called backups in Windows Explorer in My Documents folder. I also tried re-installing Windows Installer which did not work and I also tried to re-register it and that did not work either.

 

Now I will have to call my computer guy or re-install Windows XP and I do not even have the CD for it.

[gunner]

Try to boot in safe mode and restore from there. I am confused. Why are you removing programs during a scan?

[DennisD]

I can't make sense either as to what you are actually doing. As gunner says, scanning with either feature of CCleaner doesn't involve the removal of software.

 

Before you go ahead with any extreme measure, like reinstalling windows, we might be able to help you more if you explain in detail exactly what it was you did, and the result of that action.

 

Have you used CCleaner for very long, and where did you download it from, as the events you explain are really outside the normal "Scan and Clean/Repair" functions of CCleaner?

 

Have you downloaded and installed any other software recently, and have you had any problems with Malware, Viruses and such?

[Daisuke]

Ive used CCleaner for over a year & this is the first time Im having a problem. & I do think CCleaner messed up my computer because in order to uninstall Windows Installer, something in the registry mustve been deleted. I tried to restore a long time ago in safe mode & when I click Next after I choose the date to restore to it just freezes & then gives me an error.

 

& no I havent had any viruses or malware because I ran a full system check.

[DavidDave]

I used ccleaner on a dell laptop running XP. After doing a cleanup, then scanning and fixing issues in the registry, the machine runs extremely slower then it did. Can someone give me a clue? I also look ed for a way to restore the former settings and couldnt. Is this done through Windows restore? or Ccleaner? Please help!

[DennisD]

Ive used CCleaner for over a year & this is the first time Im having a problem. & I do think CCleaner messed up my computer because in order to uninstall Windows Installer, something in the registry mustve been deleted. I tried to restore a long time ago in safe mode & when I click Next after I choose the date to restore to it just freezes & then gives me an error.

 

& no I havent had any viruses or malware because I ran a full system check.

 

Can you remember what the error was? It could help a lot to know that.

 

The failure of System Restore could be down to one of many reasons. I've just had the same problem myself, and I intend to clear them all out and start with one fresh Restore Point.

 

But first, regarding your problem with Windows Installer, it may just need re-registering. I would suggest downloading Dial-A-Fix, from the following location, and run it with the "Fix Windows Installer" section checked.

 

Dial-A-Fix:

 

It's a well respected utility, used by many people on here, and may just fix your Installer problem.

 

Or you could do it manually by doing the following:

 

Go to Start/Run and type in:

msiexec /unregister [click ok]

 

Then Start/Run and type in:

msiexec /regserver [click ok]

 

Try the above fix, and see how that works.

[DennisD]

I used ccleaner on a dell laptop running XP. After doing a cleanup, then scanning and fixing issues in the registry, the machine runs extremely slower then it did. Can someone give me a clue? I also look ed for a way to restore the former settings and couldnt. Is this done through Windows restore? or Ccleaner? Please help!

 

Hi David, to restore the former settings, you simply find the backup file, which will look like this.....

 

"cc_20090116_224835.reg" (the first set of numbers is the date it was made).

 

.......and double click it or right click and select "Merge".

 

The default location for the backup is "My Documents", but if you can't find it, do a Windows search for .reg files.

[Daisuke]

I could not remember what the error was because it would take forever to pop up. I think it pretty just said it cannot proceed or something like that. But yesterday when I tried to restore, I had no more restore points... I had no clue what happened to them. And I already tried re-installing and re-registering Windows Installer and nothing ever worked. And I read somewhere that I should try un-installing XP Service Pack 3 and installing Windows Installer 3.1 but after I uninstalled the SP my computer would never start up again... every time it got to the windows logo screen it would keep restarting... so I think that is the end of that computer...

[DennisD]

Sorry I didn't get straight back to you.

 

I wouldn't write off you're computer for something which might be fixable. Uninstalling SP3 might not have been the best move, but I can understand you trying anything to put things right.

 

Have you tried pressing F8 continually when you first boot, and then giving the "Last Know Good Configuration" a try.

 

If you can get your PC booting up again, then you could run Checkdisk on the drive and see if it can find any errors. I'm reasonably sure that your problems have arisen from something more than CCleaner, but the only way to find out is to get your PC running, and then try different things and eliminate others.

 

It may be a hardware problem, or it may be faulty or corrupt drivers, or a faulty Software install or uninstall. The latter can sometimes be fixed by using "Windows Install Cleanup" utility.

 

Do you have a "Recovery Partition" on your PC? It would be visible in My Computer as a seperate drive. On my PC it's called "PRESARIO_RP (D:)". Or do you have the XP Disks?

 

As a last resort you could reinstall Windows after backing up your personal data.

[Daisuke]

The second it goes to the windows boot picture it already automatically restarts so its impossible to go to safe mode now. I already tried Last Known Configuration a long time ago. And I dont't have any Winsows CD to do anything since my computer guy made the computer for me.

[hazelnut]

Perhaps you could get a friend to download you a live cd and recover any files you need from your computer

 

http://www.howtogeek.com/howto/windows-vis...ndows-computer/

[Figaro14]

I had the same thing happen last week.  After running CCleaner registry cleaner, several Windows functions including setttings and Edge would not work.  I first attempted to restore from CCleaner and when that did not work, I did a restore from Windows.  After that, Windows would not launch at all and I had to do a complete reinstall.  Never using CCleaner again! 

[Andavari]

Microsoft doesn't support the use of registry cleaners:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/2563254/microsoft-support-policy-for-the-use-of-registry-cleaning-utilities

It's been said before that CCleaner either needs to hide the registry cleaner deeper inside the program, or better yet just remove it altogether. On a Windows 10 PC registry cleaning is likely to cause issues due to Windows 10 being updated so often.