Windows 10: Will programs uninstall properly with Win10?

I've been wondering, why when a program is uninstalled does it not uninstall every last bit of it?

Will Windows 10 do a better job, or is it not as simple as that?

:)

 

Will installing Windows 10 uninstall all programs currently being held on my PC's Hard Drive?

Hi,

Thank you for your interest in Windows 10 Technical preview.

I would recommend you to refer to the Microsoft blog before installing windows 10.

Register, install and engage | Windows Insider Program

You can refer to the Microsoft article and check if it helps:



How to: Upgrade from Previous Versions of Windows Using Windows 10 ISO file



You may refer to the Microsoft article for how to install windows 10 over windows 8, 8.1 and 7.

How to upgrade to Windows 10 from within Windows 8.1 or Windows 7 using Windows Update

Hope this information is helpful, if not let us know with the updated status and we will be happy to assist you further.

Thanks.

 

Will installing Windows 10 uninstall all programs currently being held on my PC's Hard Drive?

I want to reserve and upgrade to Windows 10 from Windows 8.1. I am just a bit hesitant to do so, not knowing if installing windows 10 will remove all currently

installed files and programs on my Windows 8.1 PC. It is also worth to note i do not use OneDrive to backup my files.

My main question is basically, will installing Windows 10 on my current Windows 8.1 PC uninstall all programs and files or will it just upgrade the OS without affecting all my local files on my HardDrive?

 

Traditional desktop programmes I would think will be the same as in previous versions of Windows, not seen anything to suggest there is any difference

newer style store apps, should be completely removed when uninstalling, traditional style apps will be coming to the store at some point (if the developers want to do this), so uninstalling them might be better when this happens, time will tell on this one

 

There are third party uninstallers that will do a better job than the standard Windows uninstaller but none of them will be perfect.. just a better.

 

It is not as simple as that. With modern technology most things are more complex than they appear.

Modern applications are complex. Typically the application will be contained in a folder in the Program Files folder but some components may be elsewhere. Program settings are typically in the registry but may also be in files in a variety of locations. There are no firm standards for this, only conventions, and they are frequently ignored. Only the application developer and installer know all the details.

To remove the application the developer typically provides an uninstaller. Unfortunately uninstallers often do not receive the attention that is warranted. Human nature being what it is, developers often find to difficult to understand why anyone would wish to uninstall their application. As a result uninstallers are often an afterthought and are not fully tested. Fully removing an application can be very difficult, particularly when it has been used by multiple users. In some cases full removal is not practical or even desirable. In many cases application settings are left behind as a convenience for users if the application is later installed.

Windows uninstaller merely serves as a front end for the developer supplied uninstaller. Installers being what they are Windows has no way of knowing for certain what registry entries and files belong to what application. In the interests of safety Windows makes no attempt to more fully remove the application. Some third party uninstallers do attempt this but they have been known to go wrong with unpredictable results. Windows prefers to err on the side of caution.

With traditional desktop applications there is nothing more that Windows can do. New style Apps are a different matter entirely.

 

Very good answer. Its more up to the software provider than Windows. Just look at McAfee and the hoops you go through to completely uninstall.

 

Manually "cleaning up" after the uninstaller is pretty easy too.

Just show Hidden Folders in File Explorer and go to C:\Users\YourName\AppData, in the Local & Roaming folders delete the files with the programs name.

Then in RegEdit go to HKEY-LOCAL_MACHINE and HKEY_CURRENT_USER and delete the keys with the programs name(NOTE: only in these two places!!!).

 

I am sorry but it's not as easy as you think. There are keys that the software developers put in the registry that cannot be removed and they often embed the key with non printable characters. For example, if you install a 30-day trial software and when it expires, you uninstall it then re-install. Do you think it will work just by deleting what you mentioned above ? I don't think so. The only way to completely remove them from your PC is to restore the backup image that you created before installing any 30-day trial software

 

That's how I clean up when I have to re-install a program(such as my USB mobile broadband software) that keeps re-installing using "old" installations settings. It has always worked good for me. You just have to stay away from WinSxS keys or it gets messy. I have also purged my Lenovo H530 of it's bulkware this way, the only thing remaining is the logo on Control Panel\All Control Panel Items\System*Wink.

 

You can use free software deployment tools to make sure programs are installed correctly and more importantly uninstalled COMPLETELY without any zombie files or zombie registry entries remaining in the registry.

One free open source tool for that is WPKG -> WPKG | Open Source Software Deployment and Distribution

But there are other ones as well.

They work after a simple principle. They record every step during an installation and basically revert the installation one by one when uninstalling. And they dont leave stuff out like some not so well implemented uninstallers do.

Some uninstaller tools are advertising complete removals but don't actually use the "recording every step" - technique.
Those maybe better than the standard windows uninstaller from "Programs & Features" but those are also not 100% efficient when it comes to removing really every hidden change of an installation (like shared system32 files, registry edits, user files).

 

As LMiller says, most often this is simply lazy or incompetent developers that don't bother to clean up everything in their uninstaller.

However, sometimes it's more difficult that that. If I write an application, and I need to install certain system files for it to run, I have no idea whether some other app might also depend on those files that was installed after me. If I remove those files, I can break other apps, so most developers opt to leave these system files alone during uninstall.

 

A lot of interesting replies above.

 

Is one of the reasons I still debate going back to linux from time to time. Windows is never really clean. With linux a simple command in the terminal 100% cleans out whatever package, no leftovers.

I prefer Windows integration with my Windows phone rather than the hodge podge between linux and android through Google else I would go back in a heartbeat :/

 

Don't kid yourself. There's all kinds of "messy" in Linux. Yes, most apps have their own configurations, but check out your /etc directory after a while, it's filled with config files for apps you don't use anymore. To be sure, you can simply delete them, but Windows is actually making a lot of inroads here.

Universal apps are now completely isolated. When you remove a Universal App, it's gone, including all configuration and support files.