My Favorite Registry Tips & Tricks Part III

As you probably know, Internet Explorer allows you to keep a list of favorites. Favorites are a quick and easy way for you to access your much loved web sites. What you may not know is that the registry editor allows you to do the same thing. So once you get tired of always having to navigate your way through the numerous keys to find what you are looking for, consider adding it to your list of registry favorites. It is much simpler to access a portion of the registry by selecting the link from your favorites instead of having to bore down to find it. Keep in mind though, that this feature is only available with regedit.exe. If you are using regedt32.exe, you are still stuck using your navigational skills.

You can add a registry key to your list of favorites using the following steps.

1. Click Start, click Run, and type regedit. Click OK.
2. Navigate to your favorite registry key.
3. Click the Favorites menu and click Add to Favorites.
4. Type in a name for the favorite and click OK.

   

5. To access one of the favorites simply select the link from the Favorites menu.

Backing up Registry Information
Often times when you are reading about tips or tricks for changing registry values, they begin with a caution to backup your registry before proceeding. However, they never tell you how to do it. If you think of the registry as the core of the operating system and you can see the importance of protecting it. The most important way of doing this, is the perform registry backups, especially if you are making changes.

You have a few different options when it comes to backing up your registry. If you happen to be using a third party backup program, it will more than likely give you the option to backup your registry. Conversely, you can also use the Backup program installed with Windows XP. You can find the program under the All Programs / Accessories /System Tools submenu. With these two methods, you’ll be performing a full backup of the registry.

Another option you have is to backup a specific part of the registry. You can do so by opening the Registry Editor. Right click the portion of the registry you want to backup and click Export as shown in the following figure. Type in a name for the registry file and specify where to save it. Finally, click Save. You can import the registry file at any time by clicking Import from the File menu.

Tags: regedit, registry trick, registry tip, registry hive, open key