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Uninstaller Roundup - Revo - Total - ZSoft & the less magnificent seven

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Steven Avery:
Hi Folks,

  Mouser, I just couldn't get myself to include the Ashampoo products :) .  Sometimes they are technically good, but you never really now what version is what, what will be tomorrow, where is the support.  I used their defrag tool for awhile, which had a minor name change ($10 program at the time) -- it was funny, like Magic to Magical -- and the defragger was helpful at the time, about 4 years back.   However in most cases I can't take them too seriously, in the Roundups.  Avanquest is similar, and maybe I am confusing the two.

   You just never really know the personality of what you have

   To be fair some of their software might be really good, might be decent value, and it will likely not be the registry and spyware scare-scam-sham-ware with recurring billing and 1000 tricks. 

   These companies are in the middle area of trying to be a mass marketeer of decent software at a low price, (which they may pick up from here or there, or develop) -- the problem is that for the really informed folks here, they will tend to be a notch or two below the programs where we really have developers who discuss and assist, the programs  that are really class and in many cases are continuing under more solid development, like the roundup leaders.

Shalom,
Steven Avery

majoMO:

@ Steven Avery, congratulations for the info about uninstallers. Useful and a good orientation to the user. A deep-rooted and arduous work. Thanks.

But, unless I am missing it, Zsoft doesn't seem to be able to hande software installs that require a reboot. Total Uninstall does this. For this reason, I will probably switch back.-edbro (April 02, 2009, 01:36 PM)
--- End quote ---

@ Edbro, ZSoft can handle "software installs that require a reboot" easily. Please see this post: ZSoft Uninstaller and reboot.

40hz:
Thanks for an excellent post Steven Avery



My take:


* If in doubt - test in a sandbox (Returnil :up: :up:) prior to installation. (+1 with edbro on that)
* For everything else, use Revo Uninstaller.
 8)

Steven Avery:
Hi Folks,

  Thanks, glad the thread has been of help.

  A couple of points came out in a GiveawayoftheDay thread that was about another software Cleanse Uninstaller. (Itself dubious since it is normally commercial and it is reported to change the file dates unnecessarily.  And appears to be similar to Revo, yet inferior.  Also, less importantly, it was said to put a registry entries with each program).

1) One caution on the snapshot method.  Installs sometimes go ahead and install .Net components or Visual Basic or Visual C++ or maybe other semi-system components, perhaps Java as well.  A snapshot method would by default go back and try to undo those parts of the install, which can cause problems. 

My take -- note carefully during the install whether anything like this occurs and if so -- note this carefully where you won't forget (perhaps a dummy folder name) -- the simplest is uninstall in the more generic Revo-style way, rather than the snapshot way. Or if you do the snapshot method anyway, come up with your plan on how to handle this.  (e.g. Java is less of a problem because you could use JavaRa and then reinstall).  However I think you would normally simply not use the snapshot method if such external components are installed. Some of our accomplished Total Commander users might share with us their experiences on this aspect.

2) Remember that certain programs have their own special uninstall utilities that may be better than an uninstall program.  JavaRa for old Java installs.  The various anti-virus removers that Norton and McAfee and maybe some others were forced to come up with immediately come to mind.  Check if they are for use instead of an uninstaller or after an uninstaller and use accordingly.

3) Forced uninstalls, where there are no add/remove entry, is a separate area of discussion.  Which programs handle this, and which handle this best, would be a subject of a little analysis in a comparative review.  Since I have not done any of those, I can simply point out that it is a feature for consideration and comparison.

Shalom,
Steven Avery

edbro:
I'm not sure I share you same concern with the snapshot method. If you didn't have java or .net before the install then the snapshot uninstaller would simply take you back to where you were before the install; no java or .net.  Why would you want to keep the secondary support software if you didn't need or want it before you installed the program you are uninstalling?

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