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Question

cant open cmd, regedit and task manager. please help!!!

Sep 1, 2018 2:25AM PDT

hey everyone,
I have messed up something in regedit in the ProgramFilesDir and when I try open one of the programs it says "this specific path does not exist".
can someone help me??

Discussion is locked

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Answer
Re: messed up
Sep 1, 2018 2:57AM PDT

Not clear what you did and what's the issue.
- what is "in regedit in ProgramFilesDir"? I can't find ProgramFilesDir in my registry.
- what exactly did you change into what?
- what did you want to change?
- are it only these 3 programs you can't run or more programs or all programs?

Since you can't run regedit to fix it, I think the only solutions are (1) go back to your latest backup of the registry, or (2) do a clean install of Windows

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thank you for the fast reply.
Sep 1, 2018 3:35AM PDT

1. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version\ProgramFilesDir
2. I wrote D:\
3. some apps didn't let me choose where to install the (like Skype and Razer synapse) so I wanted to change the default install drive from C to D
4. these are the program that I tried open and they didn't there might be more ( i can open cmd but not as an administrator).
how can I go back to my latest backup of the registry?

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Re: ProgramFilesDir
Sep 1, 2018 2:57PM PDT

No such key in my Windows 10.

To go back, try System Restore. If it doesn't work from Windows, there is an option to run it from the install disk (or stick) or the recovery drive you made, but the details may vary between different versions of the OS (Windows Vista, 7, 8.1, 10).

It makes some sense to make a system restore point just before using regedit to change the registry. I hope you did.

Post was last edited on September 2, 2018 7:08 AM PDT

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I Have It.. Did You Try Simply Changing It Back?
Sep 2, 2018 2:28PM PDT

Did you try it this way?

Instead of opening Registry Editor normally from the search line, use File Explorer to navigate manually to C:Windows\regedit.exe. RIGHT click on regedit.exe and choose "Run as administrator". When the Registry Editor window opens, navigate to "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Current Version\". Now on the right side of the registry editor, find "ProgramFilesDir" and double click on it. Change the Value Data to "C:\Program Files", then click on OK and close the Registry Editor window. Restart the computer.

Hope this helps.

Grif