His roundups of new features in Windows 10 updates have been called "the most detailed, useful Windows version previews of anyone on the web" and covered by prominent Windows journalists like Paul Thurrott and Mary Jo Foley on TWiT's Windows Weekly. Instructional tutorials he's written have been linked to by organizations like The New York Times, Wirecutter, Lifehacker, the BBC, CNET, Ars Technica, and John Gruber's Daring Fireball. The news he's broken has been covered by outlets like the BBC, The Verge, Slate, Gizmodo, Engadget, TechCrunch, Digital Trends, ZDNet, The Next Web, and Techmeme. Beyond the column, he wrote about everything from Windows to tech travel tips. He founded PCWorld's "World Beyond Windows" column, which covered the latest developments in open-source operating systems like Linux and Chrome OS. He also wrote the USA's most-saved article of 2021, according to Pocket.Ĭhris was a PCWorld columnist for two years. Beyond the web, his work has appeared in the print edition of The New York Times (September 9, 2019) and in PCWorld's print magazines, specifically in the August 2013 and July 2013 editions, where his story was on the cover. With over a decade of writing experience in the field of technology, Chris has written for a variety of publications including The New York Times, Reader's Digest, IDG's PCWorld, Digital Trends, and MakeUseOf. Chris has personally written over 2,000 articles that have been read more than one billion times-and that's just here at How-To Geek. If any problems did occur, you could always install something like Revo later and use it to remove traces of a problematic program that you've already tried to uninstall the normal way.Ĭhris Hoffman is the former Editor-in-Chief of How-To Geek. You do have to be constantly installing and uninstalling software for this to matter - typical users shouldn't really notice a difference. Even hardcore geeks would be fine without third-party uninstallers in the vast majority of situations, and such geeks would likely know how to clean up any problems by hand. If you're a geek who's constantly installing and uninstalling software, running a third-party uninstaller can help you prevent useless files from building up and programs from leaving useless libraries and other files behind. The official removal tool will likely work better. There's a reason the developers provide official removal tools you can download - but you don't need a third-party uninstaller. However, even average users may want to use dedicated removal tools when uninstalling notoriously problematic tools like Norton or McAfee. A third-party uninstaller is just another system tool that adds needless complexity to your life for questionable benefits. Standard uninstallers are generally good enough. We haven't run one on all of our computers and haven't run into much trouble when we didn't use them. When a program launches, it may make additional changes to the system's registry and future updates may add additional files elsewhere on the system.įirst of all, if you're an average user, skip the third-party uninstaller. Some programs that need to integrate more deeply with the system may dump DLLs and other files into the Windows folder or install system services. They'll also add information to the registry. Typically, installers will create a directory in Program Files as well as scatter shortcuts around the system. Instead, the installer is free to do whatever it wants to your system. They're not even managed by a package manager like they are on Linux, where the package manager keeps its own list of the files it installs. Installed programs aren't managed by the operating system, like mobile apps on Android and iOS are - although "Modern" Windows apps do work this way. Installers for desktop programs on Windows are essentially programs of their own. Related: 7 Ways Modern Windows 8 Apps Are Different From Windows Desktop Apps Why Aren't Normal Installers Always Good Enough?
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