I see windows vista is still ***** at uninstalling programs!

Jimbo

Jimbo

Jimbo

Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
6,791
Location
Newcastle, England
Christ, everytime I uninstall programs from program files/ or pf (x86) windows still leaves folders or other bits of the app all over the hard drive.

Gets on my **** it does, having to manually sift through folders and delete left overs... bloody aaaaaaaargh. :mad:
 
Noticed this too, biggest problem I have is there's no real "crap cleaning" utility yet.
 
I know its nothing major, but you would have thought after all this time, they would have got their act together. :rolleyes:

Just one of my little annoyances. :p
 
to be fair though, it isn't Vista or XP that is rubbish at unistalling programs. It is the uninstallers themselves. Windows can't be expected to monitor eveything single individual app and remove them completely. That's why the porgram developers provide the uninstallers
 
chesterstu said:
to be fair though, it isn't Vista or XP that is rubbish at unistalling programs. It is the uninstallers themselves. Windows can't be expected to monitor eveything single individual app and remove them completely. That's why the porgram developers provide the uninstallers
Click to expand...

Correct... it's nothing to do with Vista being at fault! The people who create the programs create the uninstaller utilities... and some of them are pants, notably those from anti-virus vendors!
 
Yeah I realise this is the case, but I just wish it wouldnt happen. Cos its very annoying.
 
Jimbo said:
Yeah I realise this is the case, but I just wish it wouldnt happen. Cos its very annoying.
Click to expand...

If you realise thats the case then why did your initial post say the complete and utter opposite? :p;)
 
Richdog said:
Correct... it's nothing to do with Vista being at fault! The people who create the programs create the uninstaller utilities... and some of them are pants, notably those from anti-virus vendors!
Click to expand...
One of the things I was hoping for from Vista was application monitoring. From installation through to uninstallation, I wanted it to monitor the files, folders and registry entries that an application modifies and put them back the way they were.

Obviously that's a lot more technically challenging than it sounds, but it would have been lovely to remove an application entirely without having to rely on 3rd party uninstallation software.
 
xyphic said:
One of the things I was hoping for from Vista was application monitoring. From installation through to uninstallation, I wanted it to monitor the files, folders and registry entries that an application modifies and put them back the way they were.

Obviously that's a lot more technically challenging than it sounds, but it would have been lovely to remove an application entirely without having to rely on 3rd party uninstallation software.
Click to expand...
Not possible for transactional reasons, unfortunately.
 
Are software companies still using the bad installers which don't clear up after themselves properly, today? If so, why? I assume the MS installer is free to use, and I don't think the others are are they?
 
xyphic said:
One of the things I was hoping for from Vista was application monitoring. From installation through to uninstallation, I wanted it to monitor the files, folders and registry entries that an application modifies and put them back the way they were.

Obviously that's a lot more technically challenging than it sounds, but it would have been lovely to remove an application entirely without having to rely on 3rd party uninstallation software.
Click to expand...

Agreed... if windows tracked every file and registry addtion/change of every installation and was able to detect anything that was not removed or reverted back to ts original state life would be flippin wonderful. I would gladly sacrifice a couple of GB HD space for that feature. :(
 
Yes this is one area which needs improving in Windows, and it's disappointing to see that Vista is no better than XP in this respect. I wonder if they even tried to address this issue?
 
Richdog said:
Agreed... if windows tracked every file and registry addtion/change of every installation and was able to detect anything that was not removed or reverted back to ts original state life would be flippin wonderful. I would gladly sacrifice a couple of GB HD space for that feature. :(
Click to expand...
It isn't possible though... What if program A and program B modify some system setting that is critical to their operation and then the user uninstalls program B. Program A will cease to work. It will be DLL-hell all over again!

dirtydog said:
Yes this is one area which needs improving in Windows, and it's disappointing to see that Vista is no better than XP in this respect. I wonder if they even tried to address this issue?
Click to expand...
The problem was solved years ago with Windows Installer 1.0... The problem is that Microsoft would get sued to hell if they made this the mandatory installer for Windows.
 
Last edited:
dirtydog said:
Yes this is one area which needs improving in Windows, and it's disappointing to see that Vista is no better than XP in this respect. I wonder if they even tried to address this issue?
Click to expand...

Probably not, cosidering a lot of features that were originally intended to be in Vista have been cut. I imagine it simply wouldn't have been a priority for them.
 
Richdog said:
Probably not, cosidering a lot of features that were originally intended to be in Vista have been cut. I imagine it simply wouldn't have been a priority for them.
Click to expand...
It was never on the Vista feature list because it isn't on the remit of the OS.

PS: The only 2 "big" features to be cut were WinFS and Palladium. Neither of which any non-techies understood their purpose anyway.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom