PowerTools Lite is a free software program to cleanup the Windows Registry and various other areas of the Windows operating system. It is actually a lite version of JV16 PowerTools and no longer in active development.
The last version of the program dates back to 2011, and it is not really recommended to use it anymore. Instead, we suggest you use programs like Advanced System Care instead.
The software has been designed with ease of use in mind. It suggests to perform a quick system scan on start which will display the health score of the PC and Windows Registry afterwards.
It is unclear how these values are calculated and running the cleanup tool will have no effect on the values it seems. The software comes with basic and expert modes which differ in terms of functionality and control.
Basic mode can be started with just one click and will scan the Windows Registry and other locations automatically.
Expert mode enables you to configure some of the scan rules before the scan is run. It provides access to four different configuration settings including a slider to change the scan performance, words to ignore or search for and advanced options like removing all found errors automatically or ignoring entries that get recreated by the computer system.
PowerTools Lite will display its findings in four different categories: Registry Errors, Registry Junk, MRU, and History Data and Temp Files. It is possible to take a closer look at every entry and deselect some or all of them in the process. The actual items that have been found will display the location of the item, the severity and description.
The program can create backups on the user’s request. It will also suggest to create a backup before starting the cleanup.
Update: The most recent version of the application ships with a set of new features. It has been released as a final version, and can now also immunize the computer among other things. This blocks certain known malware sites from being accessed when you are on the Internet to improve security and privacy of the system.
It appears that the module uses the Windows hosts file for that, so make sure you back it up before you run the feature as it may overwrite your existing entries there.
Another new component is the software uninstaller. It will not only remove installed programs but also scan for leftovers and suggest to remove those.
The program is rather bare bones when you compare it to popular products in the system maintenance niche. Advanced SystemCare for example offers more features and is free as well.