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I'm running Windows 7 x64. Should I be worried when my registry looks like this?
All keys with weird characters illustrated in the photo are empty.
Nilzor
Posted 2011-10-11T16:45:45.237
Reputation: 3 881
Is my registry corrupted?
Answers
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Apart from a virus scan and a decent backup (a 2TB drive can be had for $70), I wouldn't necessarily mess with it.
Specifically, we have no idea what programs or drivers are currently installed on your system. So anything is speculation at the moment.
I usually never mess with CCleaner ( a registry entry that never gets accessed doesn't cost any performance) but since it does a backup before hand, you can try your hand at that. Otherwise, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.
surfasb
Posted 2011-10-11T16:45:45.237
Reputation: 21 453
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That is a pretty strange location for any normal program to be putting stuff in it, there like that, at all. I would want to look further and longer to see if there is more of it sporatically in the registry in other locations.
In many many years of seeing odd, secured and corrupted by a program data in the registry,your pic would be the first time I would have seen it in that location. Which doesnt mean anything :-) other than what you showed where you showed it is new to me.
If somehow other locations have what looks like totally messed up stuff that is not attributed to a single item Type, meaning it transgressses unrelated keys. Then i would wonder about my hardware settings (like ram). If it is specifically only in that One location, then I would suspect bad software type of things.
The short pic of it there looks like it is too localised, and too "clean" looking to be corruption. exactally like surfasb & shinrai mentioned.
Psycogeek
Posted 2011-10-11T16:45:45.237
Reputation: 8 067
Thanks for the input. I place my bet on bad software as well. I've now deleted the weird keys, but will keep an eye on whether or not they reappear. – Nilzor – 2011-10-12T17:51:11.417
It's odd, but they could have been created by something legitimate that's just poorly written (probably replacements for foreign characters). If everything works okay, and you're not seeing new ones appear, I wouldn't worry. My question is "Why on earth are you in there in the first place if you're not having a problem?" – Shinrai – 2011-10-11T16:58:04.040
I was debugging software I've written which writes to the registry - that's why I was in regedit. And no... I don't think it's my software that has written these keys ;-) – Nilzor – 2011-10-12T17:52:16.407
I believe you...honest...;) – Shinrai – 2011-10-12T18:36:40.933