AppCleaner is a new contender, created by the developers of the software updater Update Star. The program is currently offered as a beta version for all recent versions of the Windows operating system.

It displays a tabbed interface after installation and startup. The Cleaner tab lists the four sub-tabs Apps, Browsers, Registry and Windows. It uses the usual checkbox system to enable or disable cleaning of specific temporary files.

Here is a short overview of the available cleaning options:

• Apps: Java, Adobe Flash Player, 7-Zip, Internet, Multimedia, RegEdit, Remote Desktop
• Browsers: Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, Opera, including temporary files, cookies, internet history, login data and sessions.
• Registry: services, missing clsids, missing shared dlls, mui cache, run at startup, obsolete software, fonts
• Windows: Recent Documents, Clipboard, custom folders, dns cache, file fragments, temporary files

Each section offers additional options, but the overview should be enough to give you an understanding of the program capabilities. When you compare the offered cleaning options to CCleaner, you will come to the conclusion that they are almost on pair. UpdateStar offers to add custom file locations under Options > Custom Files just like CCleaner does. The latter has the excellent CCleaner Enhancer tool which adds about 300 additional programs to CCleaner automatically.

Some other things are missing in a direct comparison. It is for instance not possible to exclude cookies comfortably from the cleaning. While it is possible to ignore files or directories to prevent them from being cleaned, it is rather cumbersome to add them to the program. All you can use is the standard file and folder browser to exclude items.

A click on the analyze button checks all enabled items for temporary files and displays the findings in list form in the interface. AppCleaner displays the overall size of the temporary data as well as the name, size and amount of each individual item. A click on Clean deletes the temporary files on the system.

AppCleaner comes with three tools, a tool to uninstall software, to manage startup items and a third to manage system restore points. They are nice to have but only as comfortable as the default Windows tools for the job.

AppCleaner is a program to look out for. It is currently in beta and it is likely that the developers will continue working on it to improve it further. It is a solid CCleaner alternative. There is however no portable version available, which some users may see as a negative.

If you like the idea of testing another temporary file cleaner for Windows, you find the program download and further information at the developer website.

The developers Pirisoft have updated CCleaner today, bringing the latest version to 3.05. The new version introduces support for new and updated programs and improvements in the scanning and cleaning functionality.

Interested users can take a look at CCleaner’s version history for the full list of changes. Probably the biggest additions are support for the recently released web browsers Internet Explorer 9 and Mozilla Firefox 4.

Internet Explorer users in addition can now clean cached feeds and add-on statistics, as well as invalid Browser Helper Objects. The developers have furthermore added support for iTunes cookie management, cleaning of obsolete Windows firewall rules, and support for more than 20 different programs, from the popular gaming platform Steam to the voice communication software TeamSpeak and Ventrilo.

A scan for obsolete Windows Services has been added to the Registry Cleaner.

v3.05.1408 (24 Mar 2011)
- Added support for Internet Explorer 9.
- Added support for Firefox 4.0.
- Added Internet Explorer Cached Feeds cleaning.
- Added Internet Explorer Add-ons Statistics cleaning.
- Added iTunes cookie management.
- Added Opera cleaning for saved/opened directories paths.
- Improved Firefox/Mozilla Saved Password cleaning.
- Improved Intelligent cookie keeping functionality.
- Improved Registry cleaning for Obsolete Software.
- Improved Registry cleaning for Unused File Extensions.
- Added Registry cleaner for Windows Services.
- Added cleaning for obsolete Firewall Rules.
- Added detection of invalid Browser Helper Objects.
- Added new environment variables for user documents. (i.e. %CommonDocuments%, %CommonMusic%, %CommonPictures%, %CommonVideo%, %MyDocuments%, %Documents%, %MyMusic%, %Music%, %MyPictures%, %Pictures%, %MyVideo%, %Video%).
- Added cleaning for Adobe Air, Advanced Searchbar, Steam, Xfire, Skype, AOL Instant Messenger, Camfrog Video Chat, Miranda Instant Messenger, Pidgin, Yahoo Messenger, ooVoo, TeamSpeak, Ventrilo Client, Ventrilo Server, FrostWire, uTorrent, Shareaza, iMesh, BearShare, DC++ and Ares.

The new cleaning options are available under the Cleaner menu in the program. CCleaner scans the system for supported programs and will display all applications that are installed on the system in the listing.

It is still recommended to use the third party program CCleaner Enhancer to add support for additional programs to the software.

CCleaner 3.0.5 is available from the developer homepage over at Piriform. The program is compatible with all 32-bit and 64-bit editions of Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows 2000, and the corresponding server operating systems.

The program is still provided as a portable version and installer, which both offer the same features and cleaning options. The interface has not changed at all, and some users may find it hard to spot any differences to previous versions of the software.

If they look at the individual cleaning options they find additional options for programs that were not supported in previous versions of the application, provided that they are installed. Included in CCleaner 3.04 are among others support for FeedDemon, Free Download Manager, Internet Download Manager and Comodo Dragon.

In addition, support has been added for Thunderbird’s and SongBird’s embedded browser and Opera’s Icon Cache folder.

The detection of temporary files for programs like AVG Antivirus, Windows Media Player and Google Chrome has been improved as well.

Here is the full list of changes of the current release:

Added support for Windows 7 SP1.
Added Internet Explorer UserData cleaning and management.
Added Safari cookie management.
Improved Google Chrome detection.
Added Google Chrome JumplistIcons folder cleaning.
Added Opera Icon Cache folder cleaning.
Added support for Comodo Dragon.
Added support for SongBird embedded browser.
Added support for Thunderbird embedded browser.
Added Registry cleaner for Sound Events.
Improved Registry cleaning for Unused File Extensions.
Improved Registry cleaning for Application Paths.
Added environment variable support in Custom Locations.
Command line exporting of embedded INIs (/export [folder path]).
Added cleaning for Excel Viewer, FeedDemon, WinDiff and Last.FM, Free Download Manager, Internet Download Accelerator and Internet Download Manager.
Improved cleaning for AntiVir Desktop, AVG AntiVirus 10.0 and Windows Media Player.
Improved system file detection security.
Minor bug fixes.

Both a 32-bit and 64-bit edition are supplied with CCleaner, regardless if the user downloads the installer or portable version. CCleaner 3.04 can be downloaded from the developer website over at Piriform.

Check out the guide How To Install And Use CCleaner and the third party tool CCleaner Enhancer which adds support for more than 200 programs to CCleaner.

System Ninja is a portable temporary files cleaner for the Windows operating system. It has to stand the comparison to the most popular in this niche CCleaner, and it does not fare that bad in the comparison.

System Ninja displays its core features in tabs in the main interface. They consist of a junk scanner, startup manager, process manager and a link to more tools which leads to a folder junk cleaner, file analyzr and the popular CCleaner add-on CCEnhancer.

The Junk Scanner lists its scan settings in the sidebar. This setting is nowhere as detailed as that of CCleaner. It lists 13 different entries, from game caches to common torrent tags and temp files. The main problem here is that it is not possible to customize the selection. If the Internet Cache is selected then all Internet Caches get deleted (for instance that of Internet Explorer, Firefox and Google Chrome). It would have been nice if selections could be made here. There are several unusual scan settings here, like the common torrent tags scan which according to the developer clears .txt files that come with many torrents.

A click on Scan Drive will scan the drive for all selected sources. The findings are directly displayed in the main interface. Each file is listed with its path, size and file type.

It is then possible to delete selected temporary files or all by clicking on the Select All button. The startup manager lists file, Registry and scheduled task startups. Especially the latter option is interesting and not that common. Startup items can be removed easily from the all sources.

The process manager lists all running processes by name only. That’s handy for users who know what they are doing, not so much however for beginners and inexperienced users. It is possible to kill multiple processes at once.

On to more tools. The Folder Junk Cleaner can be used to perform the scan for junk files in a specific folder or removable drive. The File Analyzr can compute checksums and display information about a selected file. It offers to send the file to the two virus analysis services viCheck.ca and ThreatExpert.

The last option is to update CCEnhancer and run CCleaner with the latest updated version.

System Ninja offers several interesting features that users may find interesting. The developer should consider integrating help tooltips and better customization options to improve the software. Users who would like to download and try System Ninja find the software at the developer site. The program requires the Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5.

What kind of traces are we talking about locally? Numerous if you are using the default settings of the browser, or browsers, you are using on the Internet. Probably the most known of them all are the web browser cache and cookies. The cache is filled with objects from websites that are accessed during sessions, and cookies are stored by the websites on the local system, either to track the user, save preferences or store login session information.

But there is more than that. There is the browsing history, possible downloads, browsing session information, Flash and Java plugin logs and temp files, Flash cookies, crash reports, data entered into search fields, offline cache or crash dumps. And even that may not be all.

Some web browsers offer means to clear at least some of the traces automatically. It is for instance possible to force the web browser to clear the web browsing cache, history and cookies on exit. But that’s not very efficient as it leaves lots of other traces behind.

Web Browsers Traces Eraser is a specialized tool that can be used to deal with web browsing traces of several popular browsers. The program supports the five popular web browsers Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Opera and Apple Safari, but also lesser known browsers such as Flock, K-Melon, Avant Browser, Iron, Chrome Plus or SeaMonkey.

Cleaning options are displayed for each separately in the main interface. The program activates several web browsers by default that it identifies as being installed on the system. In addition to that, it offers to clear Flash Player Shared Objects, Flash Player Sys History, Java Cache, Java Logs, Java Temp Files and several Windows operating system traces. A click on Scan does the same during a session.

The clean button spawns a suggestion to create a System Restore point before the selected locations will be cleaned of all browsing traces. That’s recommended but optional. Settings can be saved, which is fine if you do not want to remove data from a certain web browser. These settings are however not loaded by default. It is necessary to either click on the Load button to load them, or to open the program’s settings to configure the program to load the settings ini file on startup.

Web Browsers Traces Eraser is more or less a specialized version of the popular temporary file cleaner CCleaner. Its main advantage is that it supports more web browsers out of the box than CCleaner. It lacks custom locations to include portable browsers and a preview of what is going to be cleaned before it is cleaned. There is also no option to whitelist cookies and other data.

The software program is available as a portable version and installer for the Windows operating system. Users who want to give it a try can download Web Browsers Traces Eraser from the No Virus Thanks website.

ClearProg is a CCleaner alternative for Windows. The program is available as a portable program and installer, and supports hundreds of temporary file locations in Windows.

The program interface needs some getting used to time. The supported programs and locations are listed in a sidebar in the main interface. Selected by default are the usual suspects, from web browsers like Internet Explorer and Firefox to Microsoft Office, multimedia applications and Windows specific locations.

Program locations are selected for clearing with checkmarks with options to select all at once from the main toolbar.

Plugins are available in addition to preconfigured locations. A click on Extras > Plugins > Select Plugins opens the menu that currently lists 248 different programs. These programs can be selected individually. Far better than this approach is to click the Check button, which activates all installed programs automatically.

The selected plugins are then added to the sidebar listing indicating that they will be included in the cleanup.

The third option available is to create own folders and locations for cleanup. This is done by clicking on Own Folder > Add Folder in the menubar. A folder browser window is opened automatically so that folders can be picked for deletion. There is no option to add Registry keys to the listing, which limits the functionality a bit.

Finally, it is possible to run a preview scan to see the number of entries found by ClearProg, before clearing the files. There is no direct option to clear from the preview window though.

The software displays the number of cleared entries and the bytes saved in a log file, as well as totals in the end.
Options are available to switch from normal deletion mode to trash or secure deletion mode. The first moves the temporary files to the recycle bin, the second overwrites them with random data to make sure they cannot be recovered by file recovery software.

ClearProg is a solid alternative to CCleaner. The program is available for download at the developer website. It was tested on a Windows 7 Professional 64-bit system, and should work fine on most Windows systems as well. (via Caschy)

It is therefor recommended to clean the temporary files regularly to recover disk space and reduce the risk that someone else finds data on the computer that leaks private information.

The most popular third party tool for Windows to clean temporary files is CCleaner. Why? The program supports lots of different temporary file locations out of the box, is very thorough with the cleanings and offers to include custom locations to include in the cleaning.

We have recently had several articles on how to enhance CCleaner, including articles about the CCleaner Auto Updater, CCleaner Enhancer to add more programs to the application and a tip on how to run CCleaner automatically for all accounts.

But this review is not about CCleaner, it is about Moo0 DiskCleaner. It is very similar to CCleaner, in that it offers to delete temporary files on the hard drive and the system Registry. The disk cleaner is available in 17 languages as a portable version and an installer.

The application scans all supported temporary file locations on startup, and displays those that have been found in its interface. The remaining programs are hidden by default, but can be revealed by removing the Show only Related checkmark in the main interface. That’s interesting, as it provides a full listing of supported applications. The scan is a lot faster than that of CCleaner.

Each temporary location is displayed with a title, size occupied on the hard drive and items found in the location. Checkboxes at the beginning of each row can be used to select items for deletion. A click on the arrow at the very beginning of each row reveals the locations or paths of the files on the system. The Recycle Bin entry will for instance list the recycle bins of each partition separately. Cookies are displayed individually, so that they can be selected separately for deletion if needed.

The program displays the Megabytes and total item size on the Clean Now button, and updates the count automatically whenever a new selection is made.

Moo0 DiskCleaner supports adding custom targets like CCleaner, but with additional options. CCleaner only supports file locations (correct me if I’m wrong about this, but the include menu seems to suggest it), while DiskCleaner supports Registry locations as well.

DiskCleaner is a solid alternative to CCleaner. Both programs have their distinct strengths. CCleaner for instance can be configured to protect certain cookies from deletion, a setting that it remembers after restarts. Another feature of CCleaner is the ability to secure delete the files so that they cannot be recovered with file recovery software.

Moo0 DiskCleaner is compatible with 32-bit and 64-bit editions of the Microsoft Windows operating system. Interested users can download the portable version or installer from the developer website.

Open Source application BleachBit is a CCleaner alternative for Windows and Linux. The software can be used to delete temporary files and other information that are recorded by the supported operating systems and specific applications.

Running a software like BleachBit regularly protects the user’s privacy by deleting information about opened programs, files and websites. It also increases the free available hard drive space by deleting temporary files.

BleachBit is available as a portable version and installer. Both versions display the same interface on startup. The left side lists the programs and locations that can be cleaned, the right information about each entry or progress of the cleaning.

privacy software bleachbit

The information provide immediate information about each entry in a category which is helpful to determine the temporary files to be deleted. CCleaner for instance does not provide information about the entries.

The available programs and locations are comparable to CCleaner with the exception of missing custom locations. BleachBit users cannot add additional locations to the cleanup process.

BleachBit users can clear system files and locations like the Recycle Bin, logs or recent document lists as well as temporary data from programs like Skype, Thunderbird, Mozilla, Opera or Microsoft Office. Lastly there is an option to deep scan the computer system for temporary and backup files.

The preview button can be used to run a scan on the system without actually deleting files immediately. This is helpful to determine the files that are deleted and the disk space that gets recovered by doing so.

Temporary files can be overwritten automatically to prevent file recovery. Another option to prevent this is to wipe free disk space of a drive or folder. The program preferences offer options to change the files or folders and whitelist programs that should not be deleted under any circumstances.

BleachBit makes many things right. It would be a worthy CCleaner contender if the developer’s would add an option to delete files in custom locations.

Windows and Linux users can download the privacy and maintenance software from the developer’s website over at Sourceforge.

The newest version of CCleaner, which was just released, adds support for Microsoft Office 2010 next to several other program and feature additions.

CCleaner 2.32 introduces Opera search field history and favicons cleaning, Real Player SP cleaning and better support for Media Player Classic next to the support for Microsoft Office 2010 cleaning.

Users of 64-bit operating systems will experience better shortcuts cleaning. Not all of the changes have been to programs and temporary files.

* Added support for Microsoft Office 2010.
* Added Opera search field history cleaning.
* Added Real Player SP cleaning.
* Added “Analyze” and “Clean” context menu options to rule tree parent nodes.
* Added “Restore default settings” button to Advanced Options.
* Improved Opera favicons cleaning.
* Improved support for Media Player Classic.
* Improved cleaning of shortcuts on 64-bit machines.
* Improve localization support.
* Fixed bug with Russian translation.
* Minor bug fixes.

CCleaner can be downloaded from the developer’s website. The software displays an Check for updates link in the program interface which however only leads to the developer website as well.

Users who install the new version should pay attention to the items that the application wants to install as it includes the Yahoo toolbar.

Wipe will automatically scan the system upon startup offering to clear the history and traces right away or switch to advanced mode which is displaying a list of analyzed items and the amount of files on the disk, entries in the Windows Registry and the total size of the files in a list.

The items that are found are divided into categories like Windows, web browsers like Firefox or Internet Explorer and applications like Skype or Microsoft Office.

CCleaner provides a better overview of the elements that are analyzed. Wipe on the other hand displays the previously mentioned file size, Registry and file counts for each item individually which can be very helpful in determining the biggest offenders.

Each item in the list can be selected individually by clicking on the checkbox in front of its line. It is furthermore possible to select or deselect all items in a category by selecting the category header (for instance Windows 7). This will select or deselect all items automatically.

Items that can be cleared with Wipe include:

• Windows: clipboard, mru list, temporary Internet files, rss feeds carche, recent wallpapers, thumbnail caches..
• Firefox, Opera, Internet Explorer: temporary Internet files, download history, cookies, passwords..
• Windows Media Player: recent items, autocomplete and record path histry..
• Java, Flash: temporary Internet files
• Microsoft Office: recently accessed items, autocomplete history..

Missing are options to add programs or paths that are not included in the program yet. This includes for instance the Google Chrome web browser which cannot be cleaned with the program.

A click on the delete button will clear the history of all selected items. A standard delete will be performed which can be changed in the program’s options to make the traces unrecoverable. Available deletion methods are one-pass anti-recovery, DOD anti-recovery, Gutmann or Russian Gost anti-recovery (the last three only available after registration).

The deletion of files can take additional time depending on the choice in the menu. Wipe can close any running process before the history is cleared which is for instance important if the web browser is running all the time on the system.

Wipe is a good alternative to CCleaner. It lacks the customizability but offers a better overview of the files, registry entries and sizes of the entries that it lists in its interface. The program can be downloaded from the developer’s website.

CCleaner is also the requirement obviously for anyone who wants to use Click&Clean since it won’t do anything if CCleaner is not installed on the computer system. Besides placing a link in the Quick Launch Bar Click&Clean adds buttons to the web browsers Internet Explorer and Firefox which can also be used to quickly clean the system using CCleaner.

The advantage of using Click&Clean is minimal and probably only useful for optimizers and users who run CCleaner several times during a session and do not want to click more than once. Everyone else is better off using CCleaner independently.

These files can be deleted manually as well but this usually puts the effort and time solely on the user. A third possibility would be to run Atomic Cleaner which comes with a mode to clean game leftovers from a computer system.

Atomic Cleaner looks like the usual system cleaners. It can not only clean game leftovers but provides access to a temporary files and Internet cleaner as well. It offers four buttons to start the three different cleanups and one that will initiate a full system cleanup.

The user can initiate to clean the system immediately by selecting any of the four main buttons or take a look in the advanced menu. The advanced menu provides options to scan the system without removing the data immediately. Atomic Cleaner displays a table after the scan that displays the space that the user could free if he would delete the temporary data on the computer system.

The advanced menu contains the option to add additional locations that should be cleaned up regularly. This is an interesting option for users who run applications that use their own temporary folders to create files on a computer system. The only option that is missing completely is one to perform Registry cleanups.