Shop Vac for Windows Registry

[reboot]

This method is virtually foolproof for cleaning the registry, without the dreaded crashes associated with editing it.
Follow the instructions exactly!
Beware, this may take some hours to complete, depending on fragmentation of your HD, size of your vcache, size of HD, number of programs you have.

Shut down everything in the taskbar.
Do a thorough scandisk.
Do a thorough defrag.
Copy SYSTEM.DAT and USER.DAT to your root C: drive. (they're in the c:\windows directory)
START > RUN > REGEDIT.EXE
Select REGISTRY > EXPORT REGISTRY
At the flashing cursor, type: C:\TEMP.REG and hit Enter.
START > SHUTDOWN > RESTART in DOS MODE
At the C:\Windows prompt, type: REGEDIT /C C:\TEMP.REG
Wait several hours.
When it completes, type EXIT to return to windows.

Remember, this could take several hours to complete. Even if it seems to hang, leave it and walk away, it will work.
It seems to hang around 20%, and again at about 80%, this is normal, and it will continue!
Providing your system does not overheat, and crash, it will work.

When it's done, compare the size of your old user.dat and system.dat files (in root C http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif to the new ones in the C:\windows dir. Remember that this is pure text, and a 2k difference is a lot of data.

If everything is working fine, delete user.dat, system.dat, and temp.reg from the root c dir.

Cheers, and good luck.

p.s. There is no software anywhere that will clean out the registry of invalid references like this method, and this is free!

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Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[Jomama]

Very interestiing RB, I understand exporting the Registry but then you say to also copy it, is this just a saftey thing as in 2 condoms?
Secondly, what is the /c switch, Can you expond on this a little more? Thanks


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I Survived the PC Mechanic Move.

[reboot]

The /C switch is to compare entries. It scans the HD for anything associated with the registry entry. If nothing is found, it removes the entry, then writes the reg.
The idea of copying the files to root c is to compare them later to see how much difference there is. It's just a recommended step, not really necessary, as the registry export function literally does the same thing.
As far as I know it will work on all Win9x versions, but I haven't tried it with Win95a.

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Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[dan3223]

Reboot, I did a search on my system, and I don't have system.dat or user.dat anywhere, and I'm running Win98

dan

[Tiretool]

I'm ashamed to say that after following your advice I got a difference of right at a meg in my system.dat file! Does that indicate that I keep a sloppy machine? LOL I got about 200k difference in my user.dat file. That was a great post! Thanks alot!

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Is it further to Chicago than by bus?
************************************
tiretool@rednecks.com

[dan3223]

I tried it (without moving the system.dat and user.dat file, which i don't have on my system) and it took less than 5 mins, i guess my registry wasn't too bad. i like that command a lot.

okay, i think this one might belong in the hall of fame...... what do you guys think?

[leethehund]

Thanks for the info http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif! Next question - will this work on win95 as well?? I have one 98 and one 95 system in the house so I would like to use it on both!

lee

[Carl Price]

I second the Hall of Fame recommendation.

Carl

[dan3223]

It turns out the System.dat and User.dat files have the atttibutes +s +h +r on my system. To make the file readable, type ATTRIB -S -H -R XXXXXX.XXX

[reboot]

dan3223 nailed it. They are hidden files, but you can find them by selecting "view all" in Explorer view folder options > view > all...

p.s. Thanks for the nomination... http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/biggrin.gif

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Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[reboot]

Tiretool: It means that you have installed and uninstalled a lot of stuff.
Imagine just how much text is in a 200k file! That's 200,000 keystrokes. Go figure.

BTW, I like the sig, here's another:
Do you walk to work, or take a lunch?

dan3223: 5 minutes is great. That means that your system is in good shape, and it's probably a fairly new install of windows. There hasn't been enough time for it to get full of crap.

BTW, I did this on a 1 gig Western Digital on a 486 DX, with Win95a. It took just over 17 hours to complete http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/frown.gif, but it worked like a charm! 1.2MB diff in system.dat, and 126k in user.dat

------------------
Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[Ant007]

Hi People...

From what I've gathered, the process sounds great.

However, after perusing a bit more, 17 hours is a long time. Not that power outs occur in my area, I know that murphey is ALWAYS by my side.

What happens if the system is turned off accidentally, or power out, black out, brown out, meteorite, earthquake, or Hurricane Floyd decides to grace it's presence in OZ.

Thanks in advance!

Kev...*

Hmmmm... such a nice array of icons to choose from... ine mine mone mo....

[whist]

Great Post!

160K on System.dat
88K on User.dat

Might be my imagination but it seems like the ole Celery 300 is a little snappier too.

Many thanks,
Warren

[reboot]

If (God forbid) you have a power outage, or other interruption, just copy user.dat and system.dat back to the c:\windows directory, and restart.
This restores the original registry as it was before you started the process.

------------------
Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[tomr]

I tried this on two machines. Interesting results.

First machine took 32 minutes and decreased system.dat by 4KB and decreased user.dat by 40KB. Not what I expected because the change is in inverse proportion to the size of the files.

Second machine (faster processor) took 20 minutes. INCREASED the size of system.dat by 16KB and decreased user.dat by 36KB.

To keep the registry up to snuff, every month or so I start with Regclean v4.1 then run CleanSweep's Registry Cleaner and finish up with Scanreg /fix. I'm hoping that this keeps the registry from ever getting in too bad shape. I'll try your system again too, Reboot. But how do you account for the increase in size mentioned above. http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif

[This message has been edited by tomr (edited 09-20-1999).]

[Le Pacha]

I tried this on my machine over 10 times, at first the computer seemed to hang every time at either 26% or 86%, i would reboot and start all over again, the last couple of times, it actually worked to 100% but then it said it can't access registry bec it can't read c:\temp.reg and the original registry is restored. Any clue? I'm using Win 95 btw and I'm using the command prompt from the start menu not the restart in MS-DOS command from the shutdown menu, could it be that? I can't use the latter bec it doesn't detect my drives right!!! But yet i did try, same result.

[This message has been edited by Le Pacha (edited 09-20-1999).]

[pepicker]

ReBoot
Believe I know what I was doing wrong. It sounds like a great thing. Will let you know if I have any trouble. By the way, my E-mail address is two fold. lemIII@aol.com and nnil@ti.com.Keep up the great work. It sure makes it easer on us.

Linn

[reboot]

The odd time you will get an increase in file size. This is because the process found files on your HD that are not correctly identified in the reg. The process checks vxd, dll, etc. files, and if it finds a correct install with a reg error, it will write the correct stuff to the reg, so the program may be uninstalled correctly, or otherwise run with no errors.


------------------
Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[archie]

Here's my results.
System 1 - (clean install 4 mths ago): System.dat from 1.89mB to 1.8 and user.dat from 432kB to 248kB in 2 minutes.
System 2 -(clean install 10 mths ago): System.dat from 3.95mB to 3.71mB and user.dat from 1.08mB to 0.704mB in 1 hour and 50 minutes.
System 3 - (strange configuration - let's not go there) After completion (2 min), received the following message "cannot import c:\temp.reg - Error accessing the registry. The previous version has been restored."

While I haven't tested System 1 enough to make a fair evaluation, system 2 is noticeably more responsive and I plan to take out the "SHOP VAC" at the beginning of every season. http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif

[Felix]

I also vote for the hall of fame. It's a cool one. http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/biggrin.gif I guess it's the only way to *really* remove M$ office from a system except from reformat.

[This message has been edited by Felix (edited 09-21-1999).]

[Toaster]

**Applause**
Reboot, now there be something useful.
Hall of fame stuff fer sure!

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Love, love is like pee`ing your pants, it`s warm and wonderful at first, then grows cold, then leaves you a mess.

[Tiretool]

I agree! I second the motion for this to go to the hall of fame. Do I hear thirds?

[COPEN II]

I have been meaning to do this for about a week now and haven't. I actually printed this up as soon as Reboot posted it so I could always have a hardcopy.

Anyway....I'll 3rd that nomination!!!

[fred]

Uh, well, I had a go too. I have been trying to clean up the registry on one machine, that was in a bit of a mess, for a while with limited success. It took about two hours, as you said Reboot.
I must admit, I was a little worried when the PC powered back up and said my video drivers did not work with the card, but that was corrected with another boot.
Well, I claim a poor position with only 320K off System Dat, but a staggering first prize I think for 412K off User.dat
I have started the process on another machine now! Six smile today!
http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif

[Le Pacha]

hey archie, if you ever find a solution for the problem you had with system 3 would you post it. I have the same problem with my only system here.

Thanks

[Felix]

Le Pacha and archie: Maybe boot into safe mode, let Windozze re-arrange things, reboot and then process again? Who knows...

[reboot]

LePacha, you didn't read the whole thing maybe?
I stated (more than once) let it go! It will work. Do not shut it down and restart, walk away, leave it overnight, it may takeseveral hours.
I also stated that you must start in DOS mode, not a dos box.

Archie, what's with the strange config that it wouldn't work? Using something like EZBIOS maybe http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/wink.gif ?


------------------
Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[Le Pacha]

reboot, I read your messages carefully, one question, do you leave it to go even if stays for over 30 minutes with the HDD led off all the time, never lights and the %counter is fixed to the same value all thru the 30 minutes? If you mean this I'll try it again. I never meant to say I used a DOS box, I used the "Command Prompt Mode" by using F8 during start up, and the reason I have to use this mode is in my question posted in the Win 95 forum last week with no good answers till today, may be you can help http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif here it is -

http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/Forum1/HTML/000365.html

Cheers


[This message has been edited by Le Pacha (edited 09-22-1999).]

[reboot]

The only thing I can suggest is booting to a floppy, and running scandisk from there. It appears as though you have more problems. Extra partitions being reported, etc. Not good. This is an indication that your FAT is corrupt, and/or at least mis-reporting the right # of disk drives/partitions.
Try a reinstall of win98 over top of itself first. It would appear that you must sort out the other problems and be able to boot to DOS mode before running this.

------------------
Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[archie]

Allrighty Sir 'Boot, you twisted my arm, <FONT COLOR="grey">
it's a computer set up from an image on a client/server network - with pointers that, IMHO, are unavailable - the typical setup it is not. </font>

My attempt to try it on another workstation with the same configuration gave the same results. Quite frankly I won't put further effort in getting this to work but I wanted to include those results to show that if the procedure fails, the OS isn't going to be caughing blood - it is forgiving. http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif

[reboot]

Oooooooohhhhhhhhhh! I get the picture Archie.

------------------
Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[Wiz]

Had a go at it last night with my old 133 w/ win95. I couldn't get past scandisk. It kept restarting and would never finish. I tried to close out just about everything in the taskbar with same results. My guess is I have something trying to access the drive during scandisk but I can't figure out what.
Any suggestions?




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24 hours in a day ... 24 beers in a case
...coincidence?

[Carl Price]

Hey Wiz, the what that is accessing your harddrive during Scandisk is Windows itself dynamically trying to resize your swap file. Under the performance tab of system properties (device manager) go into virtual memory and uncheck the box that says let windows manage the virtual memory and click on let me specify my own virtual memory settings. Pick a size about 2-3 times the ram in your computer and make both the minimum and maximun size that same amount. This makes a permanent swap file of this size on your harddrive and windows will not try to write to it anymore while Scandisk is running. After you run Scandisk you can change this back if you want but I recommend against it. Ignore the warnings that Windows will give you when you try to do this. If you have enough harddrive space you can't hurt your system, but do not disable virtual memory.

Carl

[TechTeach]

Wiz

Make sure your screen saver is off too!

[reboot]

Wiz. Scandisk and defrag all your HDs and partitions.
If you have a program that runs from D, and the registry knows this, it will look at D to find it during the process. If D is not defragged, it will take much longer to run.

------------------
Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[Wiz]

will let y'all know tomorrow.
Thanks for all the input.


Mike

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24 hours in a day ... 24 beers in a case
...coincidence?

[Wiz]

Gents,
Worked like a champ.
Sys.dat went from 1.61 - 1.54
User.dat 112k - 100k

All in about 56 minutes.

Thanks http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif http://www.pcmech.com/ubb/smile.gif

Mike

[Wiz]

Carl,
Thanks, I will give that a try tonight. I'm running 2 drives -1 @ 1.7 (c) and 1 @ 1.5 partitioned (d and e) with 32 mb. I assume I should only run scandisk on c.

Mike

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24 hours in a day ... 24 beers in a case
...coincidence?

[M. A. Dockter]

Idea....make ramdrive....copy *.reg into it....run regedit /c

Just thinking....I might have to try it.

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M. A. Dockter
Forum Administrator
mdockter@pcmech.com

[glenrose]

Hi:

tried your regedit however I get the statement after typing
importing file (100% complete)
This takes 25 seconds to complete. Iam using a desktop locking program called fortress however I have disabled the program. I have the option to restart in msdos mode which I have.! Any ideas

thanks glenrose

[Statica]

Hey Reboot:
That procedure did eerie, strange, godless WONDERFUL things for my systems! Took 2.5 hours on my laptop, but it works as if its using CAFFIENE instead of SDRAM!
Thanx a heap!

[reboot]

Here's the trick folks.
This isn't a magical fix all.
If you have other system problems, this may not work.
It has not been tried with all available software (duh!).
If you have a stable system, that's a little cluttered, or an older install (more than 6 months), this will clean things up not fix IRQ conflicts or other problems.
If you find that the process does not work do a re-install of your current OS over top of itself, then try this again.

------------------
Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[shredmeister]

Great tip Reboot! I just did the procedure and it took a little over 2 hours. Here are my results:

Old System.dat........... 4749 KB
Old User.dat............. 1157 KB
New System.dat........... 4589 KB
New User.dat............. 961 KB

Everything seems to be running smoothly. This installation of Windows is only about 4 months old, so I must have had ALOT of junk in there!



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&gt;&gt; shred

[cwm]

WOW!user.dat; before 848KB after 716KB: System dat before 4.94 MB after 4.35 MB. And I thought that I was running a lean Registry!!!!! Thanks reboot.........

[ekoake]

Great job reboot. I tried it. It took 14 hrs. system.dat went down from 6,337Mb to 6,041. However the user.dat went up from 225kb to 661kb. Why the increase I dont know. I was actually hoping that the process will clean up my '98 freezing whenever I hang the modem (56K 3COM USR Winmodem). But it didn't. Not withstanding its a great process. Hall of fame! Definately
Thanks

[reboot]

If it takes longer than a couple of hours, you probably have lots of things on the HD(s), lots of things in temp dirs, lots of things in browser cache, a fragmented drive, possible bad sectors, or all the above.
It's a CPU intensive process, and the slower the machine, and the less RAM available, the slower it will be.

------------------
Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[alliya]

i stumbled across a link to this thread in the virtualdr win98 forum, and posted it in the windows 98 annoyances forum. received a few replies. check them out... one of them even tells how to make the process faster:
http://www.annoyances.org/cgi-bin/ce-discussion_show?n938749692

[reboot]

The process metioned at the link above does not do as throrough a job (I think).

I will try it, and let you know.

P.S. Here's the credit I promised.
This process is due to the hard work of Shane Chen, whose web page is no longer available.

------------------
Who needs a life?, I have internet!
Cheers, Jim
http://members.cnx.net/reboot

[Harry]

I am posting this here and in the Windows 95 forum.
I used the Shop Vac trick to clean out my registry in Windows 95 OSR2. Well, it cleaned out something all right because my User.dat was 548kb and afterward was 381kb. My System.dat was 4,746kb and aftward was 4,537kb
However, it cleaned out more than just my registry. Just a minute before I began running the Shop Vac, I sent email with Outlook Express so I know that Outlook Express was working fine. After running Shop Vac, all my email in the Inbox and Sentmail disappeared. And all my email settings were gone as Outlook prompted me to set it up again as though I had never used it. Can anyone explain?
Everything else seems to be working fine and so far I haven't noticed anything else missing.
Also, no one has really explained how this system works other than that it cleans out the registry. I don't understand how it is cleaning out the registry.

[dan3223]

Well, I think Reboot deserves credit for posting that procedure here. I heard about it from him first, and so did a lot of the other people here. Obviously he didn't "invent" the trick, but he took the initiative to post it here, and that's what's important.

[MyAllyCat]

I havent tried this method yet (mainly cuz i dont want to screw anything up) so i've been using Winrescue 98 for that purpose. So Reboot, I was wondering how this manual way that you describe compares to Winrescue 98 in cleaning up the registry (using either their quick regpack or expanded regpack)? Thanks for any opinions!!

[oldsailor]

reboot this is the greatest thing to come along since night baseball and the pill. Thank you.