Making changes to Windows Registry can have catastrophic effects on your system’s performance, if not done accurately. The Windows Registry houses the settings for system processes and apps so that ...

You can change Registry key values manually using the built-in Windows Registry Editor (regedit) in order to improve performance or make Windows work the way you want, but you need to know what you’re ...

The ERROR_REGISTRY_HIVE_RECOVERED error (code 685 / 0x2AD) means that Windows detected corruption in a registry hive and successfully recovered it from a backup or ...

Q. My laptop somehow got terribly screwed up. When I double-click on a Word file in Windows Explorer, a program other than Word tries to load it—and, of course, it fails. Can you help? A. It sounds ...

Sarah is a freelance writer and CNET How To blogger. Her main focus is Windows, but she also covers everything from mobile tech to video games to DIY hardware projects. She likes to press buttons and ...