Why the Most Expensive Mac Cleaning Tool Is Also The Easiest To Use (and why cleaning is good)

Right up front, let me state clearly that I am not a big fan of Mac utilities which claim to clean up your Mac to improve performance.

What I prefer is a tool that cleans out caches here and there and gives me more granular controls over what gets cleaned up and when. There’s no shortage of cheap Mac apps that claim to clean this or that, but there is a shortage of good ones.

Do You Get What You Pay For?

My preferences are for free Mac utilities that aspire to clean and improve performance. Thankfully, there are plenty around.

If you want the absolute most bang for the buck try the trio of Onyx, Maintenance, and Deeper. It’s doubtful you’ll be disappointed.

Check out The 3 Best Mac Utilities To Clean, Repair, Customize, And Unlock Hidden Features for all the details.

Or, if you prefer a more esthetic app with plenty of eye candy visuals, and you have money you don’t need and want to feel good about doing your part to stimulate the economy, there’s always ClearDisk.

Basically, what this expensive app does is give you good controls over what can be cleaned from your Mac.

Just point and click to clean.

The Languages button scans your Mac for installed languages. Select the ones you don’t really need, and ClearDisk can get rid of them and free up storage.

I don’t recall ever meeting a Mac user who didn’t know how to clean up files in the Downloads folder, but if you don’t, ClearDisk does.

It finds files in Downloads, and gives you options to save or trash.

You can see where this is going, right?

ClearDisk has an option to clear out a bunch of the cache files that reside on your Mac. Will that speed up your Mac?

Probably not so much that you’d notice. But you might feel as though you’ve done something worthwhile. After all, perception is reality.

Finally, there’s the Mac’s Trash can.

You have trashed files on your Mac but do you forget to empty the Trash can?

ClearDisk also empties the Trash. Hey. Wait a minute. Doesn’t the Mac already do that? Yes, but you’re paying big bucks for ClearDisk so you might be more inclined to use a commercial app to empty the Trash more frequently than using Apple’s built-in, and free, option.

Or, not.

There’s not much that ClearDisk does for the money that the trio of Onyx, Maintenance, and Deeper do without you spending any money at all. But, as they say, different strokes for different folks. ClearDisk is much prettier, and more soothing on the eyes, and that’s worth something, right?

From Appletown

Kate has A Few Words About An Easier, Faster, Better Way To Use Calendar On Your iPhone Or iPad. Ron asks the question everyone is asking. How Do You Find And Dispose Of iTunes Dupes? Duh. Dupe Away, My Friend. Dupe Away!

On a lighter note, and one that's certainly more fun, Tera shows us How To Use Your iPhone To Scare Store Employees When You Shop. The folks at Boomer show us How Shopping For Bargains Starts With What’s In Your Hand (plus Want, Need, Love). And, just in case you forgot, here's How To Use Your Mac And Scapple To Learn To Think Visually, Take Freeform Notes, And Mind Map.

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