Ccleaner worthless?

I have the free version of ccleaner, but I was told by a supposedly savvy computer user, that it is a useless piece of software and not worth taking up space.
I am aware of the history deleting capabilities of the browsers, but I thought the Ccleaner did a better job of it.

Windows 10 Version 22H2

bro67 said:

Yes it is a waste to do something that you can do on your own these days without the headache of having some third party tool accidentally do something because the developer thinks they know better than the end user.

Thank you very much.

Yes.

Johannes said:

I have the free version of ccleaner, but I was told by a supposedly savvy computer user, that it is a useless piece of software and not worth taking up space.
I am aware of the history deleting capabilities of the browsers, but I thought the Ccleaner did a better job of it.

Windows 10 Version 22H2

I do not install CCleaner [originally called CrapCleaner] on a computer, can be too dangerous. I use only the portable version and only certain functions. Cleaning the Registry has never failed for me over the years but as the message prudently advises do the backup of it first. Piriform has added some things I don't usually need so again, pay attention and be sure of the action you want to happen.

Berton said:

I do not install CCleaner [originally called CrapCleaner] on a computer, can be too dangerous. I use only the portable version and only certain functions. Cleaning the Registry has never failed for me over the years but as the message prudently advises do the backup of it first. Piriform has added some things I don't usually need so again, pay attention and be sure of the action you want to happen.

Thank you for the reply, I only used it to delete history and cookies.
I probably follow advice and delete the program and then use the browsers for that function.

I've been doing Garbage Collection in my computers and those of my clients, for a very long time, dating back to DOS.
I've never found any program, either free or paid, that will find and delete all the junk in any PC.

The first thing to know is what it is that you want to delete. ??? That can vary from PC to PC depending on what programs the user wants to run. For instance, there are many Internet Browsers, and each one saves its "Temporary Internet Files" in different formats and different locations.
Then there are little junk files that are easy to find and delete with a simple little one liner. For instance, "Edge" (the windows browser) saves a bunch of .old files.

I wrote a batch file, which I can run from my Desktop, which includes this line to get rid of every .bak file anywhere in the C: drive.
A number of programs create those.
del /F /S /Q C:\*.bak

And to get rid of the .old files created by "Edge"....
del /F /S /Q C:\*.old

Both commands can be run at a CMD prompt, (NOT a Power Shell prompt), or they can be put into a text file and saved with the .bat extension, so it can be run just like any executable program file.

So, my own Cleanup.bat program (DOS batch file) is a work in progress. As I find the location for some new piece of junk, I can add that location to my batch file.
And since I wrote the program to only delete the junk, and leave the system files and registry strictly Alone, I don't have to worry about my Cleanup.bat program messing up windows, like CCleaner did, twice, some years ago.

I'm glad to assist anyone who wants to create their own Cleanup.bat program.

Cheers Mates,

Other files I like to remove are *.ini as in desktop.ini and *.thn for Thumbnails.

TechnoMage said:

I've been doing Garbage Collection in my computers and those of my clients, for a very long time, dating back to DOS.
I've never found any program, either free or paid, that will find and delete all the junk in any PC.

The first thing to know is what it is that you want to delete. ??? That can vary from PC to PC depending on what programs the user wants to run. For instance, there are many Internet Browsers, and each one saves its "Temporary Internet Files" in different formats and different locations.
Then there are little junk files that are easy to find and delete with a simple little one liner. For instance, "Edge" (the windows browser) saves a bunch of .old files.

I wrote a batch file, which I can run from my Desktop, which includes this line to get rid of every .bak file anywhere in the C: drive.
A number of programs create those.
del /F /S /Q C:\*.bak

And to get rid of the .old files created by "Edge"....
del /F /S /Q C:\*.old

Both commands can be run at a CMD prompt, (NOT a Power Shell prompt), or they can be put into a text file and saved with the .bat extension, so it can be run just like any executable program file.

So, my own Cleanup.bat program (DOS batch file) is a work in progress. As I find the location for some new piece of junk, I can add that location to my batch file.
And since I wrote the program to only delete the junk, and leave the system files and registry strictly Alone, I don't have to worry about my Cleanup.bat program messing up windows, like CCleaner did, twice, some years ago.

I'm glad to assist anyone who wants to create their own Cleanup.bat program.

Cheers Mates,

The only thing I want to clean up is the browser history and cookies.
As for other files, I have no idea what they are or what they are for thus I do not bother with them.
I only have about 150 GB used of my hard drive thus it is not an issue of saving space.
I installed the Ccleaner on advice of someone and just lately someone else told me it was a useless piece of software.
Therefore I did post the question about it.
Thank you for the reply.