iolo System Mechanic 7 - 3 PCs

The good: Doesn't seem to hog resources on MY PC, but I can't really tell. Has a lot of useful functions that process at reasonable speeds. Cheap (after rebates, mine was free).The bad: doesn't have any kind of reporting to the user; won't list or detail specific problems it finds, just general categories, can't pick and choose offending problems to solve, doesn't tell you what processing results are.Stopped working within 15 minutes of first launch (double-clicking the icon, nothing happened); I expect this had something to do with downloading a Vista update shortly after installing SM7, and I uninstalled and reinstalled it again, which got SM working. So...not 100% compatible with Vista, despite downloading updates to SM7 and being almost 9 months after Vista's official release.Won't acknowledge hardware firewalls and can't be told to ignore the issue. My router is my firewall and, I dare say, a lot stronger then their software solution, but I can't tell SM I have a firewall in place and it doesn't detect it. Of course other people have complained here that SM doesn't respect Windows' built-in firewall because it doesn't control outbound traffic, but why not allow for the issue as a user choice?You must approve launch on every restart before doing anything else with your PC. Maybe this is a Vista User Authorization Control issue, but I doubt it because I already turned off that stupid bot process. Hey SM, stop bugging me and run already!Reports registry problems, wasted space, and a host of other problems on a virtually virgin drive. I really can't explain this one...I installed Vista Ultimate and a few other applications and utilities like Avast! AV, Shadowrun and iTunes on a brand-new drive, the machine ran under this build for maybe two hours, and already my drive is 20% fragged? Yeah, right.Tech support? What tech support? I emailed a question about whether I should reinstall the app after discovering it wouldn't launch (see above); never heard from them. Many of Iolo's competitors reply to service questions with an autoresponder at the very least; several have round-the-clock staff who answer your questions within hours. These guys don't.Bottom line, I'm major skeptical about this product because 1) it won't tell you specifically what's wrong with your system, 2) it doesn't tell you what it fixed, and 3) who knows whether it's finding real or phantom issues to "repair." Doing over again, I'd probably skip it and buy something else.

After reading reviews in several computer magazines, I thought that I would give the program a try. I installed it on two PC's that have Norton Internet Security 2007 installed on them (this contains a firewall).System Mechanic 7 does not recognize the firewall and reports that no firewall is installed.I tried to contact Tech Support only to find out that there is NO toll free number then a 20 minute wait on hold. The tech was most unhelpful sending me an email then terminating the call. The email was worthless in fixing the issue. I have written 2 more messages and now wait.For a program that seems to be well made, the tech support would lend me to advise others to steer away from this product.

This is a great product. It will do what it promises. Those that express issues with it have not spent the time to make the adjustments in "Program Control" to permit some of their programs to run. This is not for the user who doesn't want to be bothered with managing their system and feels intimidated making adjustments to their system. There can be problems installing on Vista Operating Systems. This is where doing the intelligent thing of checking with the Iolo website for information of issues and how to solve them will save you a lot of frustration. Pay attention to the alerts the program send you.I have used this for a couple of years (the updated versions , of course) and cleaned up numerous systems brought to me with serious virus infestations (one with over 200 virus and spyware infections).The only frustration I have is the program will not provide the full location header in the title bar of viruses or spyware it finds during scans. This would be useful to track down some Trojans that bury themselves in the registry. Having the full location listed I can go to the location and manually remove the offending code to the "Incinerator" (another wonderful function this program will let you set up). The "Incinerator" function permits you to erase programs from your system to the standard used by the US Defense Department level of security (in short: you cannot get the program back).Again, this is a wonderful Antivirus/AntiSpyware program. You need to take the time to learn how to use it to get the best results of it's numerous features.

Software has some good features (Registry Repair) but it has many problems. For example, it continues to try to log-on to their webpage despite the fact that I have set it not to check for updates. After waiting for 10 hours for it to do a major defrag, when I rechecked it told me the hard drive was still 18% fragmented. Perhaps most frustrating is the fact they the never reply to your techsupport emails ... I can't recommend anyone purchasing this product.

very old version of the software and the activation code would not work for me. co way to activate or update software