A few months a colleague of mine ask me if finallyfast.com really worked. I didn’t really know whether it did or not, so I decided to find out. I put three machines to the test. All of which I use everyday and run fine according to my standards. No spyware, virus or malware was present at the time of the scan. The subjects were:
- A brand new computer running Windows 7 with all updates and patches installed – This is my new work laptop.
- A new install Windows XP machine with all updates and patches installed – I loaded this machine with a fresh install of XP to test my theory
- Windows Vista Machine with all updates and patches – this the machine I use everyday at work.
- Macbook Pro running Snow Leopard – My everyday use personal machine.
Windows 7 machine
Much to my surprise the brand new out of the box Dell precision m4400 Windows 7 machine reported a whopping 1034 errors. It found the following errors:
- Registry errors – 956
- Missing shortcuts – 23
- Missing shared files – 24
- Missing application path – 0
- Missing help files – 0
- Invalid file extensions -31
Windows XP machine
The XP machine did a little bit better than the Windows 7 machine. It reported 51 errors.
- Registry errors – 43
- Missing shared files – 0
- Missing applications path – 0
- Missing help files – 0
- Invalid file extensions – 8
- Device driver error – 0
Windows Vista machine
I expected this machine to have the most errors. I used this machine everyday and install and uninstall programs in a regular basis. I was surprised to find out it only reported 419 errors.
- Registry errors – 17
- Missing shortcuts 286
- Missing shared files – 24
- Missing application path – 0
- Missing fonts – 0
- Missing help files – 0
- Unknown file extensions - 89
Macbook Pro
I was not expecting any significant finds on this machine. It is a mac after all. The software found 500 errors. While this is more of a joke than anything. While there are viruses for the mac, I’ve never been infected in the 8 years I’ve been a mac user.
- Internet cache – 149
- Logs – 348
- System cache – 3
Conclusion
The conclusion is that finallyfast.com is not worth spending a cent on. Your computer will not suddenly be blazing fast by fixing application paths, missing shortcuts or deleting temporary files. While there is a a certain performance to be gained from doing those things, it could be very minimal at best. Most computers out there are running slow as a result from being infected with spyware, viruses and malware. While ascentive claims to remove viruses, spyware and malware, it does not scan for them in the product offered at finallyfast.com, they have a separate product for that.
The results are a clear example of how deceptive their practices are. All the machines are running fine. Two of them are brand new! And while they errors the software found may be legit, they will certainly not make those computers any faster.
The average computer user is not savvy enough to realize that the errors found on any of the test machines are not preventing the computer from running faster, and if there is any improvement on speed it will be minimal.
Don’t waste your money on this! There are plenty of alternatives out there, some that are very good and free.
Free Alternatives
Here is a list of all the tools I use when I am presented with an infected computer. I use a combination of tools, and while some work in some cases, while others don’t. I’ve had very good success using them. And best of all, they are FREE!
- Ad-aware – Free spyware/malvare detection and removal tool.
- Free AVG – Free antivirus.
- HijackThis – Great little tool for removing malware that Hijack your browser.
- Spybot Search & Destroy – If Ad-Aware did not find it, Spybot will.
- Malwarebytes – Another great spyware/malware detection and removal tool.
So there you have it. The Free alternative to making your computer finally fast.
this article give many tips. it is useful.