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Registry: Error opening key – can’t delete it
LockedI have a key in the registry I can’t open or delete. I get the error message “Error opening key – Cannot open keyname: Error while opening key.”
I have read as many posts as I can find but no help. Everyone talks about being sure you have adminstrator rights, assigning right to the key, safe mode. No one seems to have any ideas after that. I’ve tried booting into safemode, signing on my account with administrative privileges or the default adminstrator acoount. I’ve tried to assign the key Full Control and check box to replace all child objects for Administrator and All Accounts, and it works for all but the problem key, get error message: “Registry editor could not set security in the key currently selected, or some of its subkeys.”
This all started when I tried to update Windows Media Player to version 11 so I can download and play files from my TIVO. I have version 10 and they say I have to upgrade to version 11 to play the files. In running the upgrade it always fails at the very end. The log file gives the error message as access denied on the key HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Mediaplayer\Settings\MP3encoding\lowrate. One suggestion given to me to fix it was to delete the key in question and reinstall. Well I can’t access HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Mediaplayer\Settings so there are no subkeys. I tried to open all the subkeys under HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Mediaplayer and I can open everyone except …\Settings and …\Player\CDData. I can open …\Player\Extensions.
How do I fix or delete or rename the key in question? I’m in safe mode, I’m in the administrator account, I’ve tried to change the permissions for the parent key and give to the child key, so please don’t suggest doing that again. I can’t rename it or insert another key with the same name.
When Mediaplayer 11 fails it resets to Mediaplayer 10 which still works, but I’m frustrated that I can’t access or change the keys in question.
Windows XP SP2, McAfee antivirus, I’ve scanned with Spybot S&D and Adware-SE.