Uninstall Errors?

Hi, on my father's laptop I am trying to make it as fast as possible. I pretty much upgraded it since it was a super old model (HP xf328) I believe it is fast enough and do not need a replacement just yet. When I am trying to uninstall a few unnecessary software from the "Add/Remove Programs" list, I get an Error Window that says "An installation support file could not be installed, The system cannot find the specified file". It does this for every single program I try to uninstall. What is going on with this thing, is it really time for an upgrade?thanks for all the help in advance...

Bano

 

One possibility: These programs had already been uninstalled previously but left behind entries for Add/Remove.

Go into Program Files on the root drive and see if some of them in fact exist or not.

You may also want to run CCleaner http://www.ccleaner.com/

 

I'll second CCleaner. It will clean up your uninstall list, and you can also use it to clean up any old registry entries those programs may have left (don't worry, it makes a backup of any changes).

 

say when you uninstall a program, but it still leaves a folder behind in c:/program files. Is it best to delete the folder? Thanks

 

Generally it doesn't make a difference (e.g., it's not going to slow your computer down, and there probably isn't even 500 KB of files left in these folder), but I'll occasionally go through and delete "dead" folders just so the Program Files folder is a little more tidy.

The only time you MIGHT not want to delete these folders is when there is a chance you may one day reinstall the associated programs, since what is generally left are user settings (and, in the case of games, save games) that you would have to reset upon installation.

 

Thanks; the reason why I want to delete them is to keep that folder tidy; I don't want folders of programs sticking around, when i only tried out the program and was unhappy so I uninstalled. Thanks for the advice!