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March 05, 1999 12:00 AM

What files make up the registry, and where are they?

John Savill
Windows IT Pro
InstantDoc ID #14735
Rating: (1)

A. The files that make up the registry are stored in %systemroot%/system32/config directory and consist of

  • SAM - HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SAM
  • SECURITY - HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Security
  • software - HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software
  • system - HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System & HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG
  • default - HKEY_USERS\.DEFAULT
  • Ntuser.dat - HKEY_CURRENT_USER (this file is stored in %SystemRoot%\Profiles\%username%)

There are also other files with different extensions for some of them

  • .alt - Contains a backup copy of the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System hive. Only System has a .alt file
  • .log - A log of changes to the keys and values for the hive
  • .sav - A copy of the hive as it looks at the end of the text mode stage in setup

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Comments
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  • Joshua
    2 years ago
    Mar 04, 2010

    This article is at most half correct. It describes the SYSTEM part of the registry. What about the USER part of the registry? Those are stored in individual files for each user. Where are they?

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