Microsoft Windows Registry Guide, Second Edition
Chapter 2
Using Registry Editor
Registry Editor is the tool you use to edit the registry directly. You change the registry every time you log on to the computer, and you also do it indirectly through Control Panel or the Run dialog box, which updates the registry's list of programs that you've run recently. With Registry Editor, you affect settings without the help of a user interface. That makes Registry Editor one of the operating system's most powerful and dangerous tools. On one hand, you can customize Microsoft Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 in ways that aren't possible through the user interface. On the other hand, no other tool is double-checking the settings you change.
Every version of Windows since 3.1 has had a registry editor. The editor in Windows 95 can search the registry and has an interface that is simple to use. Microsoft Windows NT 4.0 has an archaic editor that can't search and is more difficult to use than the editor in Windows 95 is, but it has capabilities unique to a secure operating system, such as the ability to set permissions on keys and edit more advanced data types such as REG_MULTI_SZ. Windows 2000 provides both editors, requiring you to switch back and forth to use each editor's unique abilities. Now, with Windows XP and Windows Server 2003, you get the best features of both editors in a single program.
Registry Editor in Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 (both referred to in this chapter as Windows unless otherwise noted) is the tool you learn about in this chapter. It's the basis for just about every set of instructions you see in this book. It is also the basis for many solutions you find in the Microsoft Knowledge Base, solutions that people post to UseNet, and so on. This chapter contains more than just instructions for how to use the editor, though. You'll find useful information that comes from my own experience using this program, such as how to search better and how to quickly back up settings before changing them, which will hopefully give you a great experience with the single most powerful tool in Windows.
Regedit Has Improved
Regedit in more recent versions of Windows makes several improvements over the version in Windows 2000:
Access the features of both Regedit and Regedt32.exe (the second registry editor in Windows 2000) in a single editor. You no longer have to flip back and forth between both registry editors to complete most tasks.
Search for keys, values, and data faster.
Add the keys you use most frequently to the Favorites menu, and then access them just by clicking their names on the menu.
Return to the last key that you selected the next time you run Regedit.
Export any portion of the registry to a text file that's much easier to read than anything earlier versions of either registry editor provided.
Additionally, Windows has made substantial improvements to the registry itself. First, Windows supports much larger registries than earlier versions of Windows did; the registry is now limited only by the amount of disk space available. Second, the registry is faster in Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 than in earlier versions of Windows. Windows keeps related keys and values closer together in the database, preventing page faults that degenerate into disk swapping. Last, Windows reduces fragmentation by allocating space for large values in 16 KB chunks. All in all, it is significantly faster to query the registry in recent versions of Windows than it was in Windows 2000.