Two instances of TB installed

[edmiller]

Hi,
Ccleaner shows 2 instances of TB installed (Win 10, 64bit).
One is version 52.9.1 with 90.8 MB, the other is 45.2.0 with 166 MB.
Both versions have the same date (7/13/2018), very likely from the last update.
However, when I checked Win Explorer I find only one install.
What is going on here?

[tanstaafl]

Uninstall might not have removed the entry for 45.2.0 from the windows registry due to some problem, though I have no clue how CCleaner would get the size of the installed program from the registry. Its possible this might be a self inflicted problem due to CCleaner getting too aggressive in cleaning the registry. Some day you might want to evaluate using Bleachbit instead.

The current version of Thunderbird (60.3) takes about 124MB. I think they very recently enabled 52.* updating to 60.* when it runs automatic updates. Beforehand you had to have manually downloaded the 60.* setup program from the web site.

[edmiller]

You may be right about CC. I just checked my wife's PC and it also shows two instances of TB.
I just downloaded Bleachbit and will check it out.
My TB says it's up to date although I'm on the update channel. Guess I have to download the new version manually.
Thanks for all the input.
Cheers,
Ed

[edmiller]

I installed Bleachbit and ran it.
However, the 2 instances are still there.
Should I try to uninstall the older version?

[tanstaafl]

I suggest you try uninstalling it. My experience is that will get rid of the bogus registry entries and no longer list it as a installed application, but it might claim that the application didn't exist etc.

Bleachbit doesn't try to clean the registry, it's designed to "free cache, delete cookies, clear Internet history, shred temporary files, delete logs, and discard junk you didn't know was there".

[edmiller]

I tried to uninstall it but it looks like it will uninstall the newer version too. The uninstall location is exactly the same.
Is there any way to get rid of the old entry via the registry?

[tanstaafl]

I don't know of a safe/reliable way to do that for somebody who is not used to editing the registry. If its not doing any harm the simplest thing would be to do nothing.

If you want to uninstall it, uninstalling will not delete your profile unless you explicitly say you want to remove all of your data.. I suggest you download the latest setup program from https://www.thunderbird.net/en-US/ , back up your profile (it can be as simple as use help -> troubleshooting information -> open folder to open file explorer at the profile, go up one directory level, and then use copy&paste to save a copy of the profile directory elsewhere) and uninstall the program. Then re-install it.