Questions about NTUSER.dat and NTUSER.ini

[gmail2]

We have a problem where user roaming profiles are growing (in some cases nearly 20 MB) despite the fact that user documents and desktop are not included in profile. I discovered that SAP is creating a folder called SAPWorkDir under the user C:\Documents and Settings\%userprofile% - which can sometimes be over 10MB depending on how much SAP is used. I decided today to try and exclude the directory from a user's roaming profile - and just have it in their local profile instead. I modified the exlcude directories in the ntuser.ini file to include the SAPWorkDir folder - but when the user logs back off the folder is copied back to the server and when I check the ntuser.ini the addition I made is gone. I can understand why the directory was copied back, because of the modification not being kept in the file - but why did the ntuser.ini change back? There's no local copy of this file, and there's no permission to change the default exclude directories - so why is this happening? I know I do this through policy, but I want to try this on a few users before rolling it out across the enterprise as we have over 200 users. Anybody got any ideas?

Second question, I'm a little confused about what exactly is stored in the NTUSER.dat file. I was going through the HKEY_USERS hive in a PC today and looking at the size of the keys (by exporting them and then checking the file size) and compared with a user's NTUSER.dat file - they were tiny ... only a few KB. I then exported the HKEY_CURRENT_USER hive and had a look at the size of that ... and compared to the NTUSER.dat file - it's massive !! I thought that these would match, no? Is some info stored in the HKEY_USERS and some stored in the NTUSER.dat? Is there any way to exlude certain parts (eg printers) from the NTUSER.dat file?

Sorry for the long post, thanks in advance

Irish Poetry - Karen O'Connor
Get your Irish Poetry Published
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[linney]

All user-specific configuration information (which appears in the HKEY_CURRENT_USER registry key) is stored in the Ntuser.dat file in the Documents and Settings\user name folder. This file contains the HKEY_CURRENT_USER part of the Windows registry".

Just a guess, size difference may be because of the format that the data is stored in?

 

[gmail2]

Just a guess, size difference may be because of the format that the data is stored in?

hmm ... you might be right, after all .reg files are text files that can be edited but the NTUSER.dat file isn't readable by a text editor (that I know of) so you might be onto something there. But each user that logs onto a PC has an entry under HKEY_USERS\{SID} - and this has very few keys, so I'm just wondering if some keys from HKEY_CURRENT_USER are stored in the NTUSER.dat file and some are stored in HKEY_USERS\{SID} ... and if so, is there any way to control which goes to where. Our users are all complaining that startup in the morning is really slow, and I'm trying my best to i find out why. I know part of the reason is because of an (IMHO) unnecessary policy which forces file permissons on the windows directory, but apart from that, I still think the logon is quiet slow anyway.

Apart from that, any ideas on why the NTUSER.ini got overwritten? I'll continue to google this, so if I happen to find out I'll post back.

Thanks for the reply

Irish Poetry - Karen O'Connor
Get your Irish Poetry Published
Garten und Landschaftsbau

 

[bcastner]

You slow startup issue is not going to be resolved my messing with the registry.

The registry as you see it is a virtual view of things. Portions of it at any major key are drawn from the five seperate hives that in total represent the registry. And yes, the hives are stored in encrypted binary and not as text files.

SIDs are maintained in the HIVEs SECURITY and SAM, for example.

Believe me, they have nothing to do with any startup slowness you might be experiencing.



____________________________
Users Helping Users

 

[linney]

The ntuser.ini file is used to set up the user roaming profile components that are not copied to the server.

Group Policy. User configuration - administrative templates - system - logon/logoff - exlude
directories in roaming profiles

The "Exclude directories in roaming profiles" policy stops working when you add paths

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/827878