Good news! There is a free application called AppCleaner that upon request, searches for all additional files of the application/widget you wish to uninstall.

Here’s an example of some of the files Appcleaner pulls up when uninstalling Safari:

You can download Appcleaner for free here.

Windows computers come with a built-in utility called the Add or Remove Programs that you must use to uninstall various applications. The following illustration shows you how to use this utility.

Uninstall Office 2007 using Add or Remove Programs

To achieve this, perform the following steps:

1. Click Start and then click Control Panel.
2. In the Control Panel window, double-click Add or Remove Programs.
3. Locate and select Office 2007.
4. Click the Remove button.

Add or Remove Programs is a very effective and easy-to-use utility but has certain limitations. You may not be able to remove certain software or programs using this utility. For instance, the Add or Remove Programs utility is often found to be wanting when used for uninstalling antivirus software.

So, how should one uninstall such software? Well, most antivirus software manufacturers provide free uninstaller tools for their line of products that you can use to uninstall such programs. Alternatively, you may seek the services of a reliable third-party uninstaller software to remove programs that cannot be completely removed using the default method. Again, with the help of an example we illustrate how you can effectively uninstall antivirus software from your Windows computer.

Uninstall McAfee Antivirus Suite

To achieve this, perform the following two tasks:

Task 1 – Remove McAfee using Add or Remove Programs

By using the steps illustrated in the previous example, first remove McAfee antivirus suite using the Add or Remove Programs utility.

Task 2 – Run the MCPR.exe tool

Next, install and run MCPR.exe, an uninstaller tool for various McAfee products that is available for free download from McAfee’s official website. Install the MCPR.exe tool on your desktop, double-click it to run it and complete the removal process.

Now that we have seen how to use the Add or Remove programs, as well as software uninstaller tools, there is one more question that needs to be addressed – what should one do to remove components, such as DirectX that don’t appear in the installed programs list and don’t come with an uninstaller tool?

To perform a directx uninstall, complete the following steps:

Important: The steps discussed below require you to edit the registry. Make sure that you make a registry backup using a reliable registry maintenance software before altering its contents. This way you can restore the registry to its last working state in case a complication error.

1. Click Start, click Run, type regedit in the Open box, and press Enter.
2. Locate the following registry key.

        HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\DirectX

1. Remove all DirectX keys and delete the DirectX folder.
2. If prompted, restart Windows.

• Run a search on your PC for “msconfig”. Once loaded it will look like this:

• Click on the Startup tab and now you will see that every ticked program on the list loads up every time you log in.

• Click OK.

The next time you log back in to your PC, depending on the amount of programs you unchecked, it will be a lot faster. When you remove unnecesary programs from loading at startup, not only will your pc boot faster, but it will also enable other programs to run faster, as your PC will have less programs to manage.