Ashampoo WinOptimizer Review - System Optimization All-Around

Analyze system

The target of this module is to show you details about the system as well as check volumes for any defective sectors and attempt repair.

You will have the basic details on hardware components such as CPU, motherboard, hard disk(s) and RAM, but software is not left aside either. The three sub-menus in “System Information” take care of this in a comprehensible manner.

This is also the place to inquire about the distribution of stored items on any of the volumes available to the system, with the help of DiskSpace Explorer. This app lists all detected elements by size, but it multiple graphic representations are also available.

If you want to see how your system ranks against other configurations, there is a benchmarking utility that can take the recorded result online. It will measure integer performance (Dhrystones), FPU performance (Whetstones) and RAM performance (RAMPerf).

Hard drive maintenance is carried out automatically in Ashampoo WinOptimizer through Disk Doctor utility, which is designed to identify defective sectors and repair them. Repairing includes damaged MFTs (Master File Table). During the procedure the system will be under heavy load, so a drop in performance is expected.

File Tools

Besides system-related functionality, Ashampoo WinOptimizer brings in a set of tools tailored to lend a hand when you need to securely delete data, encrypt/decrypt files or split and join them. File recovery is on the list, too, giving you the chance to retrieve any items that have been shift-deleted from the computer. File Tools is the module sheltering all of them.

There aren’t too many algorithms at your disposal to wipe the files beyond recovery, but with Gutmann (35 passes) and DoD 5220.22-M available you can be sure that any attempt to retrieve the data will end in frustration.

Our attempt to recover the wiped data ended in failure. We could see that there is data to be retrieved, but everything was scrambled, from content to file names.

If you want to encrypt the data you send, the entire procedure is an easy task; and the receiver does not necessarily need to have Ashampoo WinOptimizer on the system because the program can self-decrypting executables.

Splitting large files into smaller bits in order to send it over the web may no longer be a problem today, but just in case you need such service, the suite offers this function. We noticed that it is the same method used in Total Commander. In other words, you can split files with Ashampoo WinOptimizer 8 and join them with Total Commander, or vice-versa.

Recovering shift-deleted items is the last entry in the “File Tools” module. It is not an advanced system, so the rule of thumb in data recovery needs to be respected: do not place any data on the drive you want to recover the files from.

Also, formatting the drive will make the entire file rescue procedure impossible with Ashampoo’s tool. On the upside, we were successful in getting back shift-deleted data in one piece using this software (obviously, we respected all the rules).

General

The sixth and final module in the suite offers you access to the settings panel which comprises options for all the instruments in the bunch as well as to the backups created automatically whenever a modification occurs.

The Tuning Assistant available in this section, as opposed to Live Tuner, performs a one-time optimization of the settings, according to your computer usage. However, there is a set of three questions you have to answer, which cover issues such as your preference on how should Windows updates be handled, the usage frequency of search area in Start Menu and usage of “hibernate” function.

Partially based on your answers to these three questions the app delivers a bunch of optimization suggestions, which you choose to enable or not. During our tests we received some pretty weird propositions for speeding up the system.

Despite the fact that we instructed the app that we planned on using “hibernate” function it suggested hibernation mode to be turned off. When we said we did not plan on using this function there was no suggestion relating to hibernation. The good thing is that you can intervene and correct the problem.

To make things easier on you Ashampoo WinOptimizer brings with it a scheduler. This can be used to program actions like one-click optimization or drive defragmentation to run at specific times. Recurring tasks are also supported by Task Planner.

Configuring Ashampoo WinOptimizer is not a complicated endeavor, but due to the myriad of options available it can be time consuming as there are settings for almost every tool in the suite. This is the place to set up what should be tracked with system analysis or the period of time for keeping the backup files.

General configuration menu puts at your disposal the possibility to restrict running the apps in the suite to authorized users through password protection.

The applications that can be tweaked to work the way you want is not too large, but includes Drive Cleaner (set exceptions, drives, file types), Registry Optimizer (choose the types of registry entries to be detected and cleaned), Internet Cleaner (pick the browser items to be cleaned), the defragger (set the minimum fragmentation level and the amount of free space on the disk for proactive defragmentation), File Associator, DiskSpace Explorer (define file formats, adjust charts), File Wiper (define the wipe algorithm) and Undeleter (enable folder structure, choose the files that should be displayed after the scan).

The Good

The Bad

The Truth