14 DAY TRIAL // Optimization, tweaking, tuning... all these can be put into a single word: speed! When it comes to your computer, the need for speed can make you get some money out of the pocket each time you want more. More memory, larger and faster hard drives, better processors... all these will make you head towards your pocket or credit card. Even most software tweakers are not for free, you can only taste them before unleashing their full power.
You don't have to worry about the price with the program we're going to check now, it's free. Win Mechanic didn't reach version 1.0 and the road ahead seems long, but it costs you only a few minutes to download, install and test, having enough features to make it an interesting choice.
After downloading the zip file from the website I was expecting to find a setup package there, but I didn't. All you have to do in order to get Win Mechanic up&running is unpack the files to a folder on your hard drive and then run the executable file. Not too fancy, but it gets the work done. On the other hand, even for a 0.x version, I think that creating a setup package is an easy thing to do and it would make installation a lot easier for beginners.
The time has come for this mechanic to show us its skills!
Win Mechanic's welcome screen has three big buttons that enable you to speed up your computer, scan system issues and maintain it or scan hijack programs that may have infiltrated your PC. These are the main actions, and we will talk about them right away. Before that, I have to tell you that the interface reminds me of Tweak-XP, but I hope in the future the program won't become a clone, because it has a good chance on its own. Apart from the main actions, there are also three menus: summary, beginner mode and expert mode. Let's get inside and find out more about each one of these.
The Tweak Now button will take you to a clean screen with two sections: Computer Boot Optimization and System Performance Optimization. You have only seven options available here, but they can prove quite useful. Let's remind the prefetch optimizers (called Boost Up Program Performance and File Prefetch Optimization), CPU Level 2 and CD/DVD Cache Optimization or Network Capability Optimization. They are all useful features, but I'd like to be able to fine tune exactly each one of them or at least see what values they will change. The good thing for the beginners is that they can optimize all these options with just two mouse clicks after starting Win Mechanic, if they don't want to disable one of them.
Let's move on to the PC Maintenance Area. Here you can find three categories that can scan your registry for problems, and get a report about the key content of your computer in order to find hijack programs or fix computer general problems. The registry issues that can be solved by Win Mechanic are the missing items/shared dll files and the invalid settings/ActiveX objects. To do it, just click the Start Scan button, select the issues you want to fix when it finishes scanning and then click the Remove Now button. Pretty easy, isn't it?
The Hijacker Scan category displays a list with programs, services and file associations that may be dangerous to your machine. You can save the list in order to show it to your computer specialist or remove the dangerous items yourself in the Expert Mode. Be aware that if you remove items without knowing what you are doing it may damage your operating system!
The last category from the PC Maintenance Area is dedicated to Computer General Problems, and there are ten of them here. The bad thing is that you can only click to fix the problems, but can't get any hint about what's happening. You can fix problems like locked registry, disappeared hard disc, disabled command console or the disabled content menu in IE.
The third main area, Hijacker Scan, takes you to the same category that we talked about earlier. We got the main areas covered, all we have to do now is check the available menus before drawing the line.
We have three menus available: Summary, Beginner Mode and Expert Mode.
The Summary menu has three items. The first one takes you straight to the welcome screen, and nothing more. The System Info menu item displays basic hardware and software information, while the Home Page opens the producer's page in your default Internet browser.
The Beginner Mode menu has three items, two of them can be found in the welcome screen (Tweak Computer and PC Maintenance), while the Spyware Removal will ask you to download Evon Soft's free spyware removal product. Finally, the Expert Mode comes packed with twelve useful items. You can check and edit the startup list and the shell commands, start or stop system services, view and change IE settings and more.
Win Mechanic can be compared to a starter who puts passion into its work and knows well its job, only that it can't explain to others what it does and can't be called an expert... yet.
The Good
Win Mechanic has a nice interface and enough functions to make it interesting. You don't have to wreck your mouse tuning hundreds of options, so it's a good choice for beginners. Best of all, it's completely free of any charge. The Bad
I couldn't see any track of a help system. It comes with a very small read me file and that's all. There are some language mistakes here and there that don't look good at all, like "File Poperties" when right clicking a process in the "Running Process" area (I think it should have been "processes", but...). The interface has some redundant entries. I can't see the point in having two ways to access an option from the same screen using the mouse, but we have to keep in mind that this is a very early version of the program.
The Truth
Win Mechanic has strong points and weak points. It is free, it does its job well, but you can't find any help yet or control how the optimizations are done. Normally, I wouldn't recommend using programs before the 0.5 version, but this is a special case - try Win Mechanic, it may be a pleasant surprise!
Here are some snapshots of the application in action:
