UninstallingReinstalling Skyrim and Cleaning Registry : V

» Mon Dec 07, 2015 9:22 am

I've recently decided to do a clean install of Skyrim, and was thinking about how to go about cleaning the registry. I've got the Piriform CCleaner and have run the Registry section, fixing any issues that it detects (it doesn't appear to detect any issues at present); I have not used the Cleaner section or anything else. Is this sufficient?

Given that I am going to be reinstalling Skyrim to the same drive (F Drive, safely away from the UAC), and the computer will take care of the rest as regards where the saves folder goes (under My Documents on C Drive...), do I need to worry about cleaning the registry any more? I have installed and uninstalled Skyrim several times over the past two months, messing about here and there, if that makes any difference (but again, always to the same place as before).

I did notice today that in 'Add or remove programs' that I had an older version of Wrye Bash installed from late last year, so I removed that, not sure if I need to do anything else about that such as re-run CCleaner (there are no folders where stray files can hide). This was despite the fact that, the last time I had Skyrim installed back in October, I had a more recent version of Wrye Bash also installed...

» Mon Dec 07, 2015 5:37 pm

After you unistall Skyrim *that way, and clean your registry with CCleaner afterwards, you should be fine to install skyrim from scratch.

Done that a couple of times, no problems encountered so far...it works every time.

*

Spoiler

First do a standard uninstall. (Control Panel\All Control Panel Items\Programs and Features-> Uninstall The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim)

Next, delete your skyrim folder under C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\

Then delete your Skyrim directory under Documents\My Games (after backing up your save files, if you wish)

Then under C:\Users\[Your Username]\AppData\Local\ - Delete the Skyrim folder that is in it.

(You should enable to see the hidden files under windows to delete that folder.) HOW: (View - Options - Folder Options - View - Advanced Settings: Show hidden files, folders and drives)

Go to your Steam folder. Delete the folder named appcache. (Important)

Use Ccleaner after all this (http://www.filehippo.com/download_ccleaner), Go to the Registry tab and hit -

In the Options tab go to Monitoring and uncheck: Enable System Monitoring and Enable active Monitoring

Reboot your computer (Important)

Then install your game again, from scratch. !!!!

*** You don't need to uninstall Steam. ***

It would be good idea to inatall always the latest version of Wrye Bash.

Newer bug fixes and patches will only be applied to the latest version(s) of Wrye Bash (305 and higher), so at some point you will have to upgrade to the latest version anyway.

» Mon Dec 07, 2015 9:34 am

As for Vanilla Skyrim I have never had issues with the uninstall not cleaning the install properly. Using a registry cleaner is not necessary.

For mods and mod managers its different. Uninstalling Skyrim won't affect them and they might have their own uninstallers.

» Mon Dec 07, 2015 5:09 pm

Hmmm, if you don't mind my asking, why is it advised to uncheck: Enable System Monitoring and Enable active Monitoring?

Thanks.