Is using CCleaner still recommended?

[Guest]

Hi everyone! Recently, after all that's been going on with Piriform (the acquisition by Avast, the malware and the telemetry), I've started considering if using CCleaner and Defraggler is still a good idea. Are there any alternatives, particularly ones that wouldn't be too difficult for me to set up on the family computers and teach my parents to use? Is the software provided by default in Windows 10 good enough to replace the aforementioned software?

[BecauseICanTBH]

CCleaner works well for me. Just firewall it and use the portable version. I run it from a command line shortcut so it can run my custom clean just by running a shortcut on my desktop.

 

https://www.ccleaner.com/docs/ccleaner/advanced-usage/command-line-parameters

 

"D:\2.0 Software\CCleaner\CCleaner.exe" /AUTO

[Fasauceome]

I did start using defraggler very recently on a suggestion, it takes a loooooong time on the old clogged up hard drives I'm fixing up but it seems really comprehensive.

[dfsdfgfkjsefoiqzemnd]

A bit of searching shows that any CCleaner version before 5.40.6411 is considered "safe" by most privacy-conscious users, but on my Windows machine I am running 5.14.5493 because 5.36 and later can update to the latest version whenever the server prompts them to, even if you have updates turned off.  They added an executable (CCUpdate.exe) in 5.36 which runs in the task scheduler for that exact purpose.  You should be able to stop that from working though, so theoretically you can still use any version without much worry. 

Well, any version except for 5.45 which had a lot of monitoring, but they pulled that one after it sparked too much outrage.

 

This functionality was added to 5.36 and later so that Piriform could do emergency updates if needed, but the first time they actually used it was to upgrade users to 5.46, supposedly due to GDPR and other privacy regulations.

 

Quote

Since the release of v5.46 we have updated some users to this version to meet legal requirements and give users more autonomy and transparency over their privacy settings.

 

Regarding those privacy settings, guess what happened to those when they updated people's install without their consent?   Yup, they set everything to "default", which means they were collecting people's data until those people found out about the update and turned everything off again. 

 

 

 

As for defraggler, no idea.  I only have hard drives in the NAS, so the PCs themselves never need a defrag. 

[LogicalDrm]

I wouldn't use Defraggler even if someone would pay me to wait 5h on it. Way too slow, I'd rather pay for better software. That being said, I'm currently looking for another software.

[homeap5]

On 7/20/2019 at 4:44 PM, LogicalDrm said:

I wouldn't use Defraggler even if someone would pay me to wait 5h on it. Way too slow, I'd rather pay for better software. That being said, I'm currently looking for another software.

If you'll find something that is really fast, let me know. I wonder why that type of software never used lot of ram when available, but copy sector by sector - that makes defrag so slow.

[RockyRZ]

On 7/22/2019 at 5:10 AM, Gzmer1 said:

try not to use it can caurse long term issues later on.

Does this also apply to Android?

[toobladink]

On 7/20/2019 at 7:44 AM, LogicalDrm said:

I wouldn't use Defraggler even if someone would pay me to wait 5h on it. Way too slow, I'd rather pay for better software. That being said, I'm currently looking for another software.

I mean its speed is totally relative. It scans the entire drive, and that usually isn't a fast process in itself. I mean it also needs to find what files are related to each other and moves them around accordingly. Your drive is constantly reading and writing - it's a slow process. Just run it real quick before leaving for work or going to bed.

 

It's just "one of those things" where it's hard to speed up at this point, especially since it's been out for YEARS. You think they would make it lightning fast by now.

[LogicalDrm]

3 hours ago, toobladink said:

I mean its speed is totally relative. It scans the entire drive, and that usually isn't a fast process in itself. I mean it also needs to find what files are related to each other and moves them around accordingly. Your drive is constantly reading and writing - it's a slow process. Just run it real quick before leaving for work or going to bed.

 

It's just "one of those things" where it's hard to speed up at this point, especially since it's been out for YEARS. You think they would make it lightning fast by now.

You can tell that to yourself, if you like. I haven't used it for years, but last time was with 500gb HDD (something like 70% full). That took about 5h to finish. Granted, it was laptop, but I was also expecting better result than 1/3 of fragmentation fixed. If alternative can do same or better in half the time, Defragler is just not the one to pick.

 

Recuva has same slow scan-optimization going on, btw.

[steelo]

Probably a stupid question, but is it safe to use CCleaner on a SSD?

[spartaman64]

33 minutes ago, steelo said:

Probably a stupid question, but is it safe to use CCleaner on a SSD?

it just wont really do anything to improve performance and use up some of the write life of the ssd but it wont damage the ssd. ssds have something else called trim which can improve performance

[steelo]

11 minutes ago, spartaman64 said:

it just wont really do anything to improve performance and use up some of the write life of the ssd but it wont damage the ssd. ssds have something else called trim which can improve performance

Yes, I've used trim occasionally. I often use CCleaner to ensure none of my personal data remains after I log into my bank account, etc not necessarily because I'm trying to speed up the drive.

[LogicalDrm]

On 7/23/2019 at 12:31 PM, RockyRZ said:

Does this also apply to Android?

Defragging isn't needed on flash-based drives. They handle data storing differently from mechanical drives. On HDDs defragging improves read times, meaning less noise and sometimes longer lifetime.

 

18 hours ago, steelo said:

Probably a stupid question, but is it safe to use CCleaner on a SSD?

Sure. You are just removing files. Same things you could do manually, CCleaner is just automated way to do things.

 

Sorry for people reading this thread, we are talking about two different software from same developer.