I frequently review my task manager and msconfig startup items. There is a blank line in the list on the Startup Items list with a check in the check box. What is this item? There are several places that items can get added to the startup list. This particular situation is most likely a malformed registry entry. MSConfig is a nice enough tool for simple situations, but to diagnose this one, I'd break out a bigger gun. I had to, in fact. I looked, and sure enough ... I had a blank entry too. Here's a snapshot of my MSConfig highlighting the blank entry:
"...sure enough ... I had a blank entry too."
You'll not that while there's a check mark, indicating the item is "enabled", there's nothing in the Startup Item text, nor is there anything in Command. Now, if you like, you can stop here. This entry is totally benign. Since there is no Command, there is nothing happening at startup. You can safely leave it alone. If, on the other hand, you want to clean it up ... well, that requires firing up the registry editor, or RegEdit. First things first - since damaging the registry can cause some serious problems in Windows, be sure to backup the registry first. Now, on the right hand side of that MSConfig display above, you'll see a column labeled Location. Scroll and expand that column, and you'll see that my empty item lists a location of: HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run That's the location of the item in the windows registry. So fire up RegEdit (Start, Run, type RegEdit and press OK), and navigate in the left-hand pane to: My Computer In the right-hand pane you should now see a list of Name, Type and Data. These are the keys associated with the Run item. Scroll down, and we notice that one has a name, but no data:
That's our culprit. You can see that in my case it was something associated with "pdfSaver3". It could have been left over from an aborted install, or an incomplete uninstall. It's also possible that entries like this can result from viruses and spyware. Regardless of where it came from, I deleted it, restarted MSConfig, and the empty line therein was also gone as a result. Related: Article 9400 | Posted November 7, 2005 |
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You should see the "Default" entry in that location and it will not have a value (says "value not set"). That is what is showing up as a blank (for some unknown reason).
QUOTE: "Double click the "Default" entry and enter a 1 in the value and click ok, then highlight the "Default" entry and press the delete key. It will empty the key value like it should be and then it won't show up in the msconfig any more. Or at least it worked for me...good luck."
I tried this; it only set it back to (value not set). I noticed this empty line before and figured it was a windows service of some sort. Just unchecked it in MSCONFIG and that should do it... going to reboot now. Good luck everyone
Posted by: Aaron R at March 10, 2008 4:20 AMI have had a similar (identical?) blank entry with "value not set", for several months. Thanks for your explanation. I unticked it today (13 Mar 2008) at startup in msconfig, and now Windows XP appears to have cleaned it up itself, as it no longer appears on msconfig! SIMPLE.
Posted by: Bill at March 13, 2008 9:21 AMThanks alot john a rational tip.Your doctorine helped me.I had several blank entries in the startup of my registry some entries were in the HKLM\SOFTWARE\WOW6432NODE\MICROSOFT\WINDOWS\CURRENTVERSION\RUN.I followed Your procedure and I typed 1 in the default
Posted by: Kamran Khan at March 13, 2008 11:56 AMreg_sz and then i deleted that value and it removed the ghost entries from the startup of my registry.I am using windows x64 operating system.Thanks Again!
I had a blank entry in my msconfig too. Turned out to be my Logitech Wingman profiler. I had selected to not allow it to load during startup from the program options. But what this does is remove the command line from the registry. The entry is still there, bad coding I assume. I used SpyBot S&D to remove it.
Posted by: DontHAckMe at April 23, 2008 11:48 PMjust get yourself a free copy of MSConfigCleanup
very tiny, very effective, has never screwed up for me.
Posted by: Jeannie at April 29, 2008 11:09 AMI need drivers to convert a A135 S2256 to Windows XP , the Notebook came with VISTA. My client and I agree it is terrible and want to convert it but the company will not release any drivers and they said that they are not available. I have someone who said he had them and asked me which ones I needed. So we are clear ALL OF THEM. I have three in the DEVICE MGR that say UNKNOWN and a MODEM and the VIDEO CONTROLLER. Any help Leo?
Posted by: James Piedimonte at July 13, 2008 4:37 AMSomething weird is going with my PC
Posted by: Geir at August 18, 2008 9:01 AMA program (Hard Disk Sentinel)scheduled to start during boot up is not listed within the MSCONFIG/STARTUP list.
Is this something I should worry about?
I also had blank entries without the HKLM prefix
Posted by: Mike Porritt at September 19, 2008 1:27 AMTicking or unticking these did not remove them from MSCONFIG
I scanned the registry for valid entries of the same type and found them all registered under key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Shared Tools\MSConfig\startupreg\????????
Here you can tell what originally created the entries because the value of ??????? is really the name of the original application.
It seems that the de-install for some programs simply blanks the ITEM and COMMAND values and leaves the rest of the entry in the registry.
The difference between ticked and unticked entries (when viewed via MSCONFIG) is the value of HKEY for each entry.
Ticked entries have HKCU and unticked have HKLM.
Simply deleting the key below STARTUPREG in the registry path seems to clear up all traces of these dead entries.
ok well i have spybot and when i unchecked it it came up as a aol aim6 file upon clicking info it said
Posted by: steve c at October 2, 2008 6:43 PMdatabase status: typically not required
value: aim6
filename: AOLLaunch.exe
Description: aol instant messenger- start it when you want to use it
Noticed I had a blank startup entry as well. Checked regedit and noted it was due to (default).
Posted by: Frank at November 13, 2008 6:30 AM"deleted" the item as was described in the first comment. The blank item dissappeared from the startup menue. Thanks Guys!