Eliminate the ‘Registry editing has been disabled by your administrator’ message

If you have recently tried to open the Windows Registry editor (regedit) and you got a 'Registry editing has been disabled by your administrator' error message, you still have hope for working around this issue. This message may appear when you attempt to open the registry editor for many different reasons but all you want to do is get into your registry so that you may complete what you originally set out to do with your system.

This message is very common when utilizing a computer on a corporate network or one that has been "locked down" by a system or network administrator. In some cases it may be hard to work around this message when you are dealing with a computer that was setup by a corporate administrator or company IT department. We do not recommend that you attempt the task of editing the registry on a company system although you may still bend the rules anyway.

If you want to go forward with re-enabling the ability to open the registry editor then you can follow the following steps in our first technique. A second technique is provided in the case that the first does not work for your particular Windows system.

First Technique for re-enabling the ability to open the registry editor

1. Go to the Start menu and select Run.
   
2. Type in gpedit.msc and press enter
   
3. Find and open the following path on the left hand User Configuration > Administrative Templates.
   
4. Find on the right hand pane Prevent access to registry editing tools and then double click it.
5. Verify the settings for Prevent access to registry editing tools Properties. Make sure that it is configured for being Enabled. Click OK.
   
6. Restart your computer and then attempt to edit your registry (regedit).

Second Technique for re-enabling the ability to open the registry editor

Attempting the second method will actually edit your registry through a command. It is advisable that you backup your registry or computer before attempting.

1. Go to the Start menu and select Run.
   
2. Type in exactly as follows: REG add HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System /v DisableRegistryTools /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
   
3. Press enter.
4. Restart your computer and then attempt to edit your registry (regedit).

Does this process assist you in allowing you to edit your registry? Post your comments below.