You have to be very careful here in this situation. Program like you're talking about are usually crapware. They'll claim to do something but don't and just clutter you're system up with installed software. And that's if they aren't also malicious.
If you're running Windows Vista, 7 or 8 then UAC (User Accounts Control) is a good option. It will pop up a dialog any time something trys to make a change to your computer and ask you for permission.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_Account_Control Personally, I would just stick with this option since it's built into Windows and doesn't require you to install anything extra. Depending on your system specs, another program running to monitor your system could use up resources you don't have.
Here are a list of utilities for monitoring your registry. I haven't tested any of them nor do I recommend any of them. I highly suggest you do research on them before you install any of them. This list is not in any particular order.
1. Regshot unicodeRegshot is a long running utility that can quickly take a before and after snapshot of the system registry. Regshot is very much a “hands on” utility and is more for experienced or advanced users to quickly check for system changes between two different points in time. Simply create the 1st shot, install the software or run the program you want to watch, and then press 2nd shot. After comparing the differences in the 1st and 2nd shots, it will open an HTML log in your browser listing all the detected changes.Download: https://www.raymond.cc/blog/download/did/3/2. InstallWatch ProInstallWatch Pro is quite an old utility which works in a similar way to RegShot in that it tracks any changes made to your registry and files between 2 given points in time although this program is more specifically designed for tracking installs.Download: https://www.raymond.cc/blog/download/did/4/3. SpyMe ToolsThis utility has something the others in the list don’t which is a function to monitor a drive or folder in real time for file changes.Download: https://www.raymond.cc/blog/download/did/6/InstallSpy 2This tool is good for not just for tracking file and registry changes during an install, but also for general execution of programs through the monitoring of shell events like file type association or attribute changes, drive or media insertion and removal, server disconnect, folder sharing and a lot more.Download: https://www.raymond.cc/blog/download/did/5/-- Tue Jul 08, 2014 4:20 am --
WikkedEyes wrote:well depending on what you need...do you mean like avast?
I use Avast, I am pretty sure it doesn't monitor the registry. At least the free version doesn't