RegScanner Registry Tool: Overview
The RegScanner registry tool enables you to scan and search the Windows registry for specific information. Simply put, RegScanner is an extension to the search option included in the Registry Editor (Regedit) tool that comes with your Windows operating system. In Registry Editor, when you perform a search for a specific term or value, you have to press the F3 key to move to the next search item. RegScanner searches for all items that meet your search criteria and display the results in a single list. When you double-click on a value in this list, the tool will open this value in Registry Editor.
RegScanner: Benefits
RegScanner helps you:
- Display all search results in a single list-quite similar to the Windows Search feature-and eliminates the need to press F3 each time you want to jump to the next value.
- Search for registry values on the basis of strings, data length, value type, and the date a key was modified.
- Search for Unicode strings that are contained within a binary value.
- Perform a case sensitive search.
- Perform a search on the registry of remote computers-this feature makes it a useful tool for System Administrators because it enables them to work with the registries of user computers from a remote computer.
- Create an HTML report of all displayed results.
RegScanner: Using
RegScanner is quite simple to use and as it is a standalone executable file, you need not install it on your system. You can download the tool from the Nirsoft website. To run the tool, double-click on the executable, regscanner.exe.
The tool provides you with two main scan modes: Load all keys and values starting from the base key and Load only values that match the following find criteria.
When you select the Load all keys and values starting from the base key option, all values and subkeys that are contained within the key you search for are loaded.
When you select the Load only values that match the following find criteria option, only those values will be loaded that exactly match the string that you are searching for.
The RegScanner registry tool also enables you to filter the results based on modified date, length of value data, and type of value.
After you have performed the search, results are displayed in the RegScanner window. This window provides you with various options that you can use to work with the results.
- You can export and load configuration information of reported results to and from a file, respectively.
- You can export selected items to a separate .reg file. This is useful if you want to make a backup of specific registry values. When you double-click on the .reg file that is created, the backed up registry values are restored to the registry.
- Many times, we search the registry after a program uninstall to ensure that all values related to the program have been removed. You can use the RegScanner tool to search for any left over entries related to the program. After the results are displayed, you may scan through them, select the values you want to remove, and then select the File > Create Delete .Reg file. This will save all the values to be deleted in a separate .reg file. Double-clicking on this file will enable you to delete all the selected results. This tool is also useful when you want to create .reg files that help in deleting registry entries made by malware programs on user computers.
- You can also use the Save Selected Items command in the File menu to save the selected results in a separate file.
- The tool also enables you to create HTML reports for the displayed results. You can create these reports from the View menu of the RegScanner window.
To sum up, RegScanner enhances your Window registry search results and provides you with options that make it quite simple for you to work with the Windows registry.