Registry

Registry is a database which stores the s/w and hardware information of a computer.This resides(contains) in the file user.dat and system.dat from windows 95 version onwards ; before that there was no concept of registry apart from this all informations are stored in the following files Config.sys,autoexec.bat,system.ini,control.ini,win.ini. For editing the registry files windows supplies 'Regedit' named tool .Registry details can be exported and imported .Exported registry files with be .reg extension ;its a text based file.

REGEDIT4
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\Setup]
"setup type"=dword.00000000
"cmdline"=setup_new setup
"System Perfix"=hex:c5,0b,00,00,40,36,02

In registry the hyphone symbol '-' is used for commenting.

Based upon the information registry is divided into 6 sections.

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT
--------------------
This section contains the information of different type of file extensions,OLE related details,Drag & drop features ,Windows shortcut ,User interface etc.


HKEY_CURRENT_USER
-----------------
Contains the information of login user detials and their desktop and start menu settings.

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
-------------------
This stores information about hardware and s/w details .There are many subkeys in this section

Config :
--------
Contains information about assemblence of different hardwares .

Enum :
------
It contains all details about device drivers in the PC.

Hardware :
---------
It contains information about Serial Port ,Processors,Floating Point Processers etc

Network :
--------
Network related details .

Software :
---------
Information about What all Softwares installed in the PC.

System :
--------
It deals with information about the device drivers which is uesd in the Pcand its assembly details.

HKEY_USERS
----------
Contains the information of all user detials and their desktop and start menu settings.


HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG
-------------------
Details about Hardware Configuration.

HKEY_DYN_DATA
--------------


In registry there are 5 different datatypes

1) REG_BINARY : This datatypes are used for mainly storing hardware related informations .Its value is shhown in hexadecimal format.
2) REG_DWORD : This is 4 byte in length ,consist of boolean data 0 and 1 .Its value can be seen in hexadecimal or in decimal format .
3) REG_SZ : String datatype.
4) REG_EXPAND_SZ :
5) REG_MULTI_SZ :

Start menu delay

Hkey_current_user\control Panel\desktop locate

Menushowdelay change value from 400 to 15

AUTOMATICALLY KILL TASK

To allow Windows XP to close non-responsive applications automatically upon shutdown:

Open REGEDIT and navigate to 'HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop'

Highlight the value 'AutoEndTasks.'

Change the value to '1'

XP will now be able to close hung applications without user input during the shutdown process.

Close hung applications

Open REGEDIT and navigate to 'HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop'

Highlight the value 'AutoEndTasks.'

Change the value to '1'

XP will now be able to close hung applications without user input during the shutdown process.

Disable Recent Documents

The bad thing about Recent Documents History is that Windows XP has to calculate
what should be put there each time you boot Windows, which can slow things down.
1. Open the Registry Editor (select Start/Run, type regedit, and click OK).
2. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Mcft\Windows\
CurrentVersion\Policies\Explorer.
3. Create a NoRecentDocsHistory D_WORD key. Double-click the value to open it
once it is created.
4. Set the Data Value to 1 to enable the restriction.
5. Click OK and close the Registry Editor. You'll need to restart the computer for the
change to take effect.

To clean Run Menu

To clean Run Menu
---------------------

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current

Version\Exploere\RunMRU

Delete what all entries that you not need ;but dont delete default MRU List

value.