For one-click cleaning the stand-out product is Advanced WindowsCare Personal from IObit. The Personal version is a feature-reduced version of their $29.95 Professional product. Features missing in the Personal version include automated scheduling, commercial use licensing, tech support and some advanced tuning tweaks. However, the Personal version does include almost everything else: adware/spyware cleaning and immunization, removal of useless temporary files from your hard drives, Windows registry cleaning, startup program analysis, erasure of private browsing history, plus a number of system and security tweaks.
There's an impressive package for a freebie, and this, combined with one click operation, makes Advanced WindowsCare Personal an easy top recommendation for non-technical users. It really lacks in one area only: hard-drive defragmentation. However, IObit, the makers of Advanced WindowsCare, offer on their website an excellent free defrag program called SmartDefrag. If you use this in conjunction with Advanced WindowsCare, you will have a remarkably complete tune-up package for zip.
Those of you who are more technically inclined will find the lack of fine control in Advanced WindowsCare frustrating, and it's more likely that you'll be attracted to the use of several specialized packages which offer more settings and better user control. This approach is less convenient than a one-click package that "does it all" but, ultimately, it's more customizable to the individual user's needs and offers more powerful cleaning functions.
And it's also less dangerous. A one-click approach encourages haste and discourages careful consideration of what you are about to do. Advanced WindowsCare provides an option to create a system checkpoint (before you start cleaning) which allows you to bale out if something goes wrong (and I suspect that something will go wrong sooner or later). A better approach is the use of multiple programs, which will encourage you to stop and think, and that's a good thing.
There are several different tune-up utility combinations that can be used. Many of you, in fact, are using some of these utilities already, but for those of you who aren't, here's my basic "freeware clean-up kit" suggestion:
Spyware/Adware Cleaning: AVG Anti-Spyware
Disk and Privacy Cleaning: CCleaner
Registry Cleaner: EasyCleaner
Defragmenter: Diskeeper V7
I recommend that you run the utilities in the order of appearance in the list above. Do check the settings for each program before you run it, particularly CCleaner, whose default settings are a little aggressive. Remember that cleaning your PC always involves a small element of risk, so backup your data and create a Restore Point before you start.
If you find that you have spyware that can't be removed by AVG, I suggest that you download HijackThis at the site listed below, and follow the instructions. They will also tell you how to paste the output to the Tom Coyote web forums. These folks should be able to help you get rid of the problem permanently. It won't cost you a cent either.
So how often should you tune up your PC? For most users I recommend that you run a spyware scan weekly and the other cleaning operations monthly. After each monthly Windows update is an excellent time to run a clean up. If you install and uninstall a lot of products you may, however, want to increase this frequency to weekly.
If you have never tuned up your PC, then you should see a real improvement in speed and responsiveness the first time you run these programs. However, on subsequent runs the improvement may be much less noticeable.
Advanced WindowsCare Personal
Website: http://www.iobit.com/AdvancedWindowsCarePersonal/index.html
Download link: http://www.download.com/Advanced-WindowsCare-Personal/3000-2086-10407614.html?part=dl-AdvancedW&subj=dl&tag=button
Author: IObit
Current version: 2.60
Version date: January 17, 2008
License: Freeware
Download File size: 5.3MB
Operating Systems Supported: 2000/XP/Vista
Additional Software Required: None
64 Bit Capable: Yes
Portable Version Available: No
Non-English languages supported: Yes
Other relevant information: None
SmartDefrag
Website: http://www.iobit.com/SmartDefrag/index.html
Download link: http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=5318
Author: IObit
Current version: 4.03 Beta
Version date: January 6, 2007
License: Freeware
Download File size: 1.5MB
Operating Systems Supported: 2000/XP/Vista
Additional Software Required: None
64 Bit Capable: Yes
Portable Version Available: No
Non-English languages supported: Yes
Other relevant information: None
AVG Anti-Spyware
Website: http://www.ewido.net/en/
Download link: http://www.ewido.net/en/download/
Author: Grisoft
Current version: 7.5.1.43
Version date: January 3, 2008
License: Freeware
Download File size: 13.46MB
Operating Systems Supported: 2000/XP/Vista
Additional Software Required: None
64 Bit Capable: Yes
Portable Version Available: No
Non-English languages supported: Yes
Other relevant information: None
CCleaner
Website: http://www.ccleaner.com/
Download link: http://www.ccleaner.com/download
Author: Piriform Ltd.
Current version: 2.0.7.575
Version date: April 28, 2008
License: Freeware
Download Filesize: 2,830KB
Operating Systems Supported: Win9x/Me/NT4/2000/2003/XP/Vista<
Additional Software Required: None
64 Bit Capable: No
Portable Version Available: Yes
Non-English languages supported: Albanian, Arabic, Bosanski, Bulgarian, Català, Cesky, Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Dansk, Deutsch, Español, Français, Galego, Greek, Hebrew, Italiano, Japanese, Korean, Lietuviu, Macedonian, Magyar, Nederlands, Norwegian, Polski, Português, Português (do Brasil), Romana, Russian, Serbian Cyrillic, Serbian Latin, Slovensky, Suomi, Svenska, Türkçe
Other relevant information: None
EasyCleaner
Website: http://personal.inet.fi/business/toniarts/ecleane.htm
Download link: http://personal.inet.fi/business/toniarts/ecleane.htm
Author: Toni Arts
Current version: 2.0
Version date: June 6, 2006
License: Freeware
Download File size: 2MB
Operating Systems Supported: 95/98/Me/NT/2000/XP/2003 Server/Vista
Additional Software Required: Windows 95 requires Winsock 2 update, available from http://www.microsoft.com
64 Bit Capable: Yes
Portable Version Available: No
Non-English languages supported: Yes
Other relevant information: None
Diskeeper V7
Website: http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=1207
Download link: http://www.majorgeeks.com/download.php?det=1207
Author: Executive Software
Current version: 7.0.418
Version date: October 18, 2002
License: Freeware
Download File size: 12.1MB
Operating Systems Supported: 95/98/Me/NT/2000/XP/2003 Server/Vista
Additional Software Required: None
64 Bit Capable: Yes
Portable Version Available: No
Non-English languages supported: Yes
Other relevant information: None
HijackThis
Website: http://www.tomcoyote.org/hjt/
Download link: http://www.whatthetech.com/hijackthis_v2/
Author: Trend Micro
Current version: 2.02
Version date: July 6, 2007
License: Freeware
Download File size: 362KB
Operating Systems Supported: 95/98/Me/NT/2000/XP/2003 Server/Vista
Additional Software Required: None
64 Bit Capable: Yes
Portable Version Available: No
Non-English languages supported: NA
Other relevant information: Merijn sold HijackThis to Trend Micro. They’ve released HijackThis V2 (version 2). The quick start guide for it can be found here. Unless you’re using Windows Vista, HJT v2 is not required.