Backup Your Registry

Many tools are used to back up your Registry. Some come with the Windows Operating System, others are third party software. Older operating systems like Windows 95 required a manual repair process (renaming files from *.dat to *.da0 and back again) if you wanted to restore an older version of the Registry. Windows automatically backed it up for you; you had to manually restore it. This was not fun. Now, we have System Restore which comes with Windows XP.

So now that we know a bit about the Registry and options for backup available, we need to cover how to back up XP’s Registry for our future tweaking. Hardening the TCP/IP Stack for Denial of Service Attacks (a future article’s story) will cover Registry tweaking such as this.

The Registry (as I said earlier) is the nervous system so If it’s damaged, it’s a good bet that Windows is going to start to experience critical errors and ruin your day for sure. With a solid backup in place, you don’t need to worry so much about making a mistake making changes. Its good to be careful, but at least you’re covered if you make a mistake. It’s so simple to backup the Registry; there is no way you can blow it!

First, you should know that your Windows XP system *unless you disabled it* is covered under System Restore. Make sure you are logged on as the Administrator or at least have Administrative privileges to the XP system.
Start => all Programs => Accessories => System Tools => System Restore



Walk through System Restore and make a backup.



Next, remember that changes only take place once you reboot the system. When you do (after you make your Registry Hacks), that’s when you will see the fireworks… or should I say – the infamous BSOD?
Exporting the Registry. You can export the registry in hives or you can export the whole thing. Either way, it all depends on the type of change you are making or if you think you will be able to recover from it or not enough to get it repaired. This is a quick way to backup the Registry but not perfect, System Restore is your best bet.
Open the Registry Editor (Start => Run => Regedit).
Go to File => Import or Export.
If you Export, you can save this to a Registry file (*.reg)



If you need to you can rename a key. If you were going to make a change to one key, make the duplicate key and rename it this way if you need to come back to the original setting, you have it there, if you just delete the key, you may have to reference another machine and if it’s an application specific setting, you may not be able to recover from it if you don’t have the install disks for it anymore. It happens.



If these all fail or if you're planning on major surgery in your Registry, you should seriously consider using System Restore. This is the best option for XP only if XP will no longer boot. If that’s the case, then you will need to rely on the Automated System Recovery and Recovery Console.
Congratulations! Now you are ready to begin tweaking with your services...