Microsoft® Windows Server 2003: Administrator’s Companion

Using the Registry Editors

On those occasions when you need to change values in the registry, you have to use some kind of registry editor. Many of the settings you can change in control panels, Group Policy objects, or MMC snap-ins are actually stored in the registry, so you can think of these utilities as a kind of registry editor. Another kind is the custom-written script you use to make a specific change, perhaps as part of a logon script or a file you distribute to your users. However, most of the time when you need to make a change directly to the registry, you use one of the provided Windows registry editing utilities.

There are two primary tools you can use to edit your registry. You can always configure items in the MMC snap-ins, but ...