Registry Optimization

This Reg Organizer feature allows you to optimize the files where the system Registry is stored. Optimization consists of two operations: defragmenting and compressing the Registry.

• About Registry Defragmentation
• About Registry Compression
• How Often Should I Optimize the Registry?
  

About Registry Defragmentation

When the computer is running under the Windows operating system, the system Registry is constantly accessed; that is, data are written and read. Since the Registry is stored in files, the Registry files are rewritten partially each time information is added to the Registry. This may result in fragmented Registry files which means that different parts of one and the same file are located in different disk sectors.

What are the consequences of having fragmented Registry files? Reading data from a fragmented Registry file requires more time than reading data from a file written sequentially on the disk.

You can solve this problem by using the defragmentation feature in Reg Organizer. Reg Organizer will analyze the level of fragmentation of your Registry files so you know whether the Registry needs defragmentation. Then it will write each Registry file on the disk sequentially and thus defragment each file.

About Registry Compression

There is a peculiarity in how the Windows operating system functions: When a key is removed from the system Registry, it is not actually deleted, but only marked as deleted. This is done to accelerate working with the Registry. If you only mark a key as deleted instead of actually deleting it, you save some time.

However, this mechanism has a drawback: The size of the Registry is not decreased if "deleted" keys remain in the Registry. Information about deleted Registry entries is often stored for quite a long time.

Deleted Registry keys is only one of the problems that Reg Organizer's system Registry compression feature deals with. It often happens that the Registry contains other unnecessary information as well.

What are the consequences of having unnecessary information in the Registry? The Registry grows to an unreasonable size. Even though the Registry is relatively small compared with the size of an average hard disk, it still may contain too much redundant information. You can use the Registry Optimization mode in Reg Organizer to see the amount of redundant information in the Registry. Then you can implement compression to considerably reduce the space the Registry occupies on the disk.

How Often Should I Optimize the Registry?

Recommended: You should optimize the Registry regularly.

The frequency depends on how extensively you work with the computer. Information the optimization feature displays after analyzing your system will help you determine whether you should optimize the Registry immediately. You can see information about the amount of unnecessary data in the Registry and about the defragmentation level on the Summary tab in the Registry Optimization mode.

Recommended: You should optimize the Registry after removing all unnecessary Registry entries.

For example, after you complete automatic or manual Registry cleanup, optimize the Registry. Even after data is removed from the Registry, its size may not change in some cases. Optimization removes this unnecessary information from the Registry.

Also, optimization can be useful after operations that result in writing a lot of new data to the Registry, for example, after installing a large program. The Registry may become fragmented when a lot of data is written to it. Fragmentation is not good for the Registry because it increases the time needed to access.