Alternatives to commercial system utilities?

[Thetech]

Hi all!

I just read this article at laptopmag.com
And I was wondering if there were any free or open source alternatives. One of the utilities that actually seems like something I could use would be system mechanic, does anyone know of a good alternative to that?

 

[Nothinman]

I consider them all snakeoil. The built-in defrag tool is good enough, you can schedule it in XP and in Vista that's already done for you. The benefits of the rest of the things they claim to do are dubious at best.

 

[AmberClad]

If you don't like the defragger that came with Windows, give AusLogic a try. It's free (and not in the trialware/shareware sense of "free").

Couple of other freeware programs:
- CCleaner
- Winpatrol

Those two are main handy for getting rid of adware/tracking cookies/temporary files that are no longer needed, registry keys that are linked to programs that have been uninstalled, etc.

 

[lxskllr]

I'm with Nothinman for the most part. Windows runs fine without adding dubious performance enhancers. I've used CCleaner to get rid of a stubborn installer, but otherwise I run Windows clean, and have never had performance enhancers do what they said they would. Some have even reduced performance, proven through benchmarks.

 

[Thetech]

Thanks all! I used CCleaner and it cleared everything right up, I'm going to check out winpatrol, BTW can I use CCleaner to clean out programs that failed to uninstall?

 

[Thetech]

bump

 

[Rottie]

I doubt it