With
Over 60 Million downloads and many awards to-date this is one hell of a popular
registry repair tool and it is easy to see why -
Registry Mechanic has definitely one of the most appealing user interfaces
of any of the registry repair tools on the market today that makes
this tool real easy to use and hence its popularity.
But Registry Mechanic has also catered for the more experienced pc
user by including a load of additional features most notably the tools
available in the "Optimize Your System" section.
We do however wonder even with its popularity why registry mechanic
doesn't have a Start Up Manager to manage startup programs on your
computer, or an Uninstall Manager to remove
programs you may not require and to our surprise a Scheduler to automate the running of the scan
Systems Supported
Windows 98
2000, XP & Vista
Price
Up to 3
computer license only $29.95 . PC Tools
also offer heavy discounts on their anti-spyware product - Spyware
Doctor or their anti- virus product when you purchase a
registry mechanic license
Company Profile & Product Information
The Registry
Mechanic tool is a registered trademark of pctools.com and with over
60 millions downloads is the most popular registry repair software on
the market. They are also the developers of the multi-award wining
anti-spyware product
Spyware Doctor. The latest release of the Registry Mechanic
software is version 8.0.0.9
What Registry Mechanic Does
Registry
Mechanic will safely clean, repair and optimize the Windows registry with a few simple mouse clicks. It can
restore and clean up the following
Software locations
Registry Integrity
Windows Fonts
Help & Resources
Shared Dlls
Startup Programs
Add / Remove Programs
Virtual Devices
File Extensions
Custom Controls
Temp File / Short Cuts
Registry
Mechanic Feature Set
Registry Mechanic has actually more features than some of the
others more expensive products we tested. Some you will find are
just links out to desktop features available on the windows OS yet
it is great to have these all in a central location within the tool
Fast Scan ( on Main Screen / Scan Your Registry Button ) The scan runs fast and progress bar and the no of errors are
clearly reported. On completion the scan will show the errors in
sections on the left of the screen with error count and the
corresponding full error message and severity on the right of the
screen which makes each error easy to understand
A concern we have to mention here were the number of errors reported
by the scan. It was 50% lower than some of the other tools we
tested which did really surprise us
Registry Compactor ( in the Home link )
Registry compacting will optimize your windows registry by removing
gaps and wasted space thus improving system performance. We reduced
the registry size by a decent 3.25 megabytes after running
this on one of our laptops. Please note this can take a minute or
two to run and it will suspend your system for the duration.
System Optimizer ( Home link / Optimize Your System
Screen )
This is a simple one click button that will tweak your computer to
run at optimum performance. From within this section you can also
check what processes are running on your computer, how performance
is, disk space left and system information about your pc
You can also schedule a windows defrag of your hard drive from here.
This is a great feature to have and something you should consider running on a month basis to
ensure your hard drive is keep uncluttered.
Automatic Backups ( Options Link / Restore ) No need to worry about backing up your registry as registry
mechanic will
back it up automatically in advance of running the scan. Each backup
is listed by date & time in the backup option and you can
restore to any previous version listed by just clicking on the
restore button
Computer Management ( Computer link & System
link)
These links allows you easy access from within registry mechanic to
many of the windows management tools so tasks like looking for
system information, the control panel, system properties, disk
management & the performance monitor are all accessible from the
touch of a button - a nice to have more than something that is
absolutely essential
Smart Update ( link at top of interface )
Keeping the software up to date is just a simple case of
clicking the smart update link but we do wonder why the registry
mechanic developers didn't include this feature on startup therefore
ensuring users would always have the latest version of the
software
No. of Errors
Reported by the Registry Mechanic Software
Registry
Mechanic is fully supported by the developers of the product pctools.com. They have a very simple yet comprehensive free online
support service that will answer your questions promptly &
professionally backed up by email support also.
Safety
Registry
Mechanic is very safe as it backups up the registry automatically before running the
scan and does an excellent job of identifying the severity of errors
by including an easy to follow indicator so as to minimize the risk of
you accidentally deleting a file you shouldn't.
