Serious Discussion Uninstalr: Or how I tested all the Windows uninstallers and ended up making a new one

[Morro]

Well, it was with only two programs, but I was able to remove 2 programs without getting a BSOD with the new version, so that is good.

I also have a suggestion/request? Would it be possible to add in a future version a possibility to either pick the program you want to install with Uninstalr, from within the program, or from the context menu. Both would be great, but one of the two is great as well.

 

[jv16]

Well, it was with only two programs, but I was able to remove 2 programs without getting a BSOD with the new version, so that is good.

I also have a suggestion/request? Would it be possible to add in a future version a possibility to either pick the program you want to install with Uninstalr, from within the program, or from the context menu. Both would be great, but one of the two is great as well.

Thank you for confirming that the BSOD issue is now fixed!

Fun fact: The problem was caused by Uninstalr terminating a system process. As an engineer, I think it's wild that it is possible for a normal application just to call a Windows API, asking it to terminate a process, and this can cause Windows to display BSOD. If there are system processes that Windows doesn't want users to terminate, how about just not allowing the API call to terminate that? Anyway.

Perhaps two other people have also requested the ability to uninstall apps via the context menu. Sounds like something I need to see if I can add to the program! It will be an optional feature, of course. I want to keep the default settings of the app such that it doesn't modify the system in any way.

 

[JohnR]

Well, it was with only two programs, but I was able to remove 2 programs without getting a BSOD with the new version, so that is good.

Confirm, no more the BSOD

 

[Back3]

Have tried version 1.1. The portable one. Uninstalled leftovers from Excel and OneNote; the leftovers from Powerpoint included items from LibreOffice. Did not touch that.
Made a second try after having edited the data. Everything went well.

 

[simmerskool]

@jv16 (fwiw) I downloaded the uninstalr portable version on win10, ran it and liked it. No helpful comments (yet), more importantly no complaints. well done

 

[JohnR]

Uninstalled O&O defrag, Windows now reports that its own in built defrag tool is no longer installed on the system. Not had the time to investigate further, sorry.

 

[simmerskool]

Uninstalled O&O defrag, Windows now reports that its own in built defrag tool is no longer installed on the system. Not had the time to investigate further, sorry.

my hunch is that is due to O&O irregularities and not necessarily the fault of Uninstalr, based on a "bad" experience I had with O&O way back when...

 

[B-boy/StyLe/]

Hi,

It seems that your tool has some issues detecting new installed software, like the latest nightly version of AviDemux.

https://avidemux.org/nightly/win64/avidemux_2.8.2%20r230710_win64.exe

Also, can you add search? Sorry if you already have such an option, but I didn't find it. It will be way easier to search for apps instead of using the alphabet.

And the monitoring option doesn't seem to work as intended? It didn't detect a few apps that I tried to install (including AviDemux). Does it create snapshots before and after the installation process like the similar tools?

Also, you may don't know, but REVO has a batch uninstall feature available. And for the leftovers, I don't think that Revo and Hibit are that bad, like in your results on the site. I could be wrong, but I am using them from a long time, and I am pretty satisfied with the results. Manual searching for orphaned entries proved it for me that they both did their job as it should. Well probably there is a room for an improvement but still...

Keep up the good work!

 

[jv16]

Have tried version 1.1. The portable one. Uninstalled leftovers from Excel and OneNote; the leftovers from Powerpoint included items from LibreOffice. Did not touch that.
Made a second try after having edited the data. Everything went well.

This is a good point. There is a system in Uninstalr that attempts to automatically detect whether the software one is about to uninstall seems to be relating to any other software, not selected for uninstallation, and if that is detect, an additional confirmation is shown to the user to recommend them to be extra careful. I have noticed that this detection is not as good as it should be, so I will be improving this for the next version. What you are describing sounds exactly the kind of case where that system should kick in.

Thank you for letting me know!

 

[jv16]

Hi,

It seems that your tool has some issues detecting new installed software, like the latest nightly version of AviDemux.

Confirmed! I shall fix this for the next build. Thank you for letting me know!

Also, can you add search? Sorry if you already have such an option, but I didn't find it. It will be way easier to search for apps instead of using the alphabet.

The search is already there, above the buttons it says "Search:" and you can simply type in anything you want to show on the screen. If you click the Filter text, you will see even more search / filtering options.

And the monitoring option doesn't seem to work as intended? It didn't detect a few apps that I tried to install (including AviDemux). Does it create snapshots before and after the installation process like the similar tools?

It creates a snapshot and then monitors whether any new software is installed after that. But it cannot detect AviDemux, because of a bug within Uninstalr. Can you name any other software it failed to detect? If I can reproduce the problem, I can fix it.

Also, you may don't know, but REVO has a batch uninstall feature available. And for the leftovers, I don't think that Revo and Hibit are that bad, like in your results on the site. I could be wrong, but I am using them from a long time, and I am pretty satisfied with the results. Manual searching for orphaned entries proved it for me that they both did their job as it should. Well probably there is a room for an improvement but still...

Revo has a batch uninstall feature, yes, but it simply failed to automatically uninstall many software. In other words, it claims it can batch uninstall software, but in my testing, it just failed to do so.

In my opinion, both Revo and Hibit offer a very poor user experience and poor uninstallation performance and accuracy. If you are happy with the way they work, you should use them but I personally don't understand why people would use them.

In my test of Revo, it failed to automate the uninstallation of Blender, iTunes, Mailbird, Spotify, KMPlayer, Apple Mobile Device Support, AIMP, Internet Download Manager, IrfanView, Core Temp and Apple Software Update and it required user’s help in uninstalling these apps. Hibit uninstaller doesn't even support batch uninstall. EDIT: Hibit says it supports batch uninstall, but it just fails in doing so.

You can see Revo failing to perform an unattended batch uninstall here:

 

[pxxb1]

Confirmed! I shall fix this for the next build. Thank you for letting me know!



The search is already there, above the buttons it says "Search:" and you can simply type in anything you want to show on the screen. If you click the Filter text, you will see even more search / filtering options.



It creates a snapshot and then monitors whether any new software is installed after that. But it cannot detect AviDemux, because of a bug within Uninstalr. Can you name any other software it failed to detect? If I can reproduce the problem, I can fix it.



Revo has a batch uninstall feature, yes, but it simply failed to automatically uninstall many software. In other words, it claims it can batch uninstall software, but in my testing, it just failed to do so.

In my opinion, both Revo and Hibit offer a very poor user experience and poor uninstallation performance and accuracy. If you are happy with the way they work, you should use them but I personally don't understand why people would use them.

In my test of Revo, it failed to automate the uninstallation of Blender, iTunes, Mailbird, Spotify, KMPlayer, Apple Mobile Device Support, AIMP, Internet Download Manager, IrfanView, Core Temp and Apple Software Update and it required user’s help in uninstalling these apps. Hibit uninstaller doesn't even support batch uninstall.

You can see Revo failing to perform an unattended batch uninstall here:

In HiBit one ticks the box for the programs one wants to uninstall and the click - Uninstall, and it will uninstall all the programs one by one. It is easy to uninstall several programs at once in HiBit. That function has never failed for me while using it.

 

[jv16]

In HiBit one ticks the box for the programs one wants to uninstall and the click - Uninstall, and it will uninstall all the programs one by one. It is easy to uninstall several programs at once in HiBit. That function has never failed for me while using it.

You are correct, I edited my previous message. What I meant was that Hibit claims to support batch uninstallation, but it fails to perform an unattended batch uninstallation. You can see it failing in the video that I posted, Hibit test starts at 423 seconds.

 

[JohnR]

@jv16, have repeated this possible niggle on both Win11 a spare Win10 laptop.
Install and run O&O defrag 26 (requires an Email address), restart PC and uninstall O&O using Uninstalr; results in the Win defrag tool failing to launch and message as per image.

 

[jv16]

@jv16, have repeated this possible niggle on both Win11 a spare Win10 laptop.
Install and run O&O defrag 26 (requires an Email address), restart PC and uninstall O&O using Uninstalr; results in the Win defrag tool failing to launch and message as per image. Perhaps someone else could confirm.

Thank you for reporting! I shall investigate. In any case, the so called similarity check within Uninstalr should warn user for uninstalling something like this, that is, that they should read the list of data to be removed very carefully before proceeding.

 

[JohnR]

Uninstalr should warn user for uninstalling something like this.

No warnings or suggestion to be extra careful etc, have noted in previous post you already have this marked for further improvement.

 

[piquiteco]

@jv16, have repeated this possible niggle on both Win11 a spare Win10 laptop.
Install and run O&O defrag 26 (requires an Email address), restart PC and uninstall O&O using Uninstalr; results in the Win defrag tool failing to launch and message as per image.

When you install O&O defrag, it sets it as default disk defragmenter in Windows. I recommend you to use the native uninstaller of O&O defrag to get it back to the default Windows Defrag settings, then use Uninstalr to scan and remove the leftovers of O&O defrag. I, strongly recommend that you always create a restore point first, before installing O&O defrag or any other product. Btw I apologize to @jv16 for posting in his thread.

 

[JohnR]

Am only using O&O and a couple of other unnecessary software's for testing and have already restored, which is perhaps just as well, as I don't think its possible to re-install the Windows defrag tool via control panel (despite the helpful message suggesting such).

 

[piquiteco]

Am only using O&O and a couple of other unnecessary software's for testing and have already restored, which is perhaps just as well, as I don't think its possible to re-install the Windows defrag tool via control panel (despite the helpful message suggesting such).

If the original Windows defragmenter does not come back, you type in the run services.msc search for the defrag service, if it is disabled, enable it and leave it for manual or automatically and check if the Windows defragmenter now works. Some disk defragmentation programs like O&O Defrag, Rasco Perfect Disk, they usually standardize their software for defragmentation, overriding Windows, you always stay tuned when installing such an application, to uncheck the checkboxes in the installation process so as not to standardize as Windows defragmentation software.

 

[pxxb1]

You are correct, I edited my previous message. What I meant was that Hibit claims to support batch uninstallation, but it fails to perform an unattended batch uninstallation. You can see it failing in the video that I posted, Hibit test starts at 423 seconds.

It does support batch uninstall, so the "claim" as you call it, is correct. This is the info on the site; "Remove multiple programs at once", and that it does. It says nothing about attended or unattended, it is only you who do that. So it does not fail or are a failed program, that is false information on your part. Your program do not become better by bashing other programs, you only come off as unserious.

So, HiBit uninstaller supports batch uninstall - period.

 

[jackuars]

Thank you for reporting! I shall investigate. In any case, the so called similarity check within Uninstalr should warn user for uninstalling something like this, that is, that they should read the list of data to be removed very carefully before proceeding.

HiBit supports batch uninstallation, but it does not support complete silent uninstallation. I would prefer batch uninstallation over silent uninstallation because in the latter, the extra prompts from running the program's uninstaller would select the default option, which is generally not the best choice.

For example, in the demo video of HiBit on IDM, a pop-up appeared asking if you wanted to perform a default uninstall or a full uninstall. When you selected the default uninstall, it defeated the purpose of the test and pop-up, which was to see how many leftovers remained behind, when you wanted to completely remove the program. But I do see the advantages of having silent uninstallation, for improving the overall user experience.

Also its worth noting that you used another product created by you, WinFindr, to check for leftover files/folders and registry keys after uninstallation. This may bias the overall purpose of these tests. You could easily optimize Uninstalr with the results of WinFindr.

All things considered, since it's a completely free product, it's a shiny new toy for me.