If you’re familiar with the Windows registry, you may be aware of the existence of a HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG hive. There are many important parts to the registry. It is, after all, the glue that holds all of our applications and programs together. However, the HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG is one of the most important keys in the registry. It’s the part that stores the current hardware configuration interface so that we can interact not just with the operating system, but with the hardware that it’s connected to. Without this functionality, our PCs would be pretty muse useless.

It’s important to realize that the HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG hive is actually an alias, a live copy, of another location in the Windows system. For Windows 95 and Windows 98, this is mapped to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Config\Profile. While for newer Windows NT models, the hive copies across from HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Hardware. This was added on newer systems to ensure backwards compatibility and it would mean that the same HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG settings would be available across three different types of operating systems.

When you open the HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG tree, the first thing you notice will be two sub-keys. These are the system and software sub keys, both of significant importance in their own right. Once again, these two sub keys aren’t actually the permanent settings of the system and software hives. They are rather a temporary record of the current settings stored in the real time configuration.

It may sound a little confusing, so remember that when you make a change to your system profile, whether it be a printer setting, a web cam channel or anything that relies on hardware, this change will immediately be saved in to your HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG table rather than the permanent system hive. Why? Well, it’s because that is your current configuration which has been saved until the next time you alter your settings. A permanent change to the system hive would overrule this and force the HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG to be re-written and redefined.

Expanding the system sub key in HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG will display a whole host of further settings that are customisable and possible to edit. You shouldn’t make any changes here unless you’re absolutely sure of what you’re doing. And even then, it’s not recommended without specialised registry editing software to automate the process.

If you have yet to create any additional hardware profiles, your HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG hive will remain essentially empty (but for a few video card configuration settings), and you will instead run off of the default system and software settings.

Back in the days of Windows 95 and Windows 98, the HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG hive was actually made up of a System folder and a Display folder. The Display folder included a bunch of video settings and also configurations and for font usage. It was only when Windows NT 4 was introduced that the Display folder was subbed out for a more general Software configuration, although they still cover a lot of the same ground in the options that they make available.

Always be careful when editing the HKEY_CURRENT_CONFIG hive, and try to use automated software where possible. This will minimise the possibility of having an adverse effect on your system settings!