Enable a Grayed out Task Manager

by PC Freak on October 8, 2007

I recently had a glitch in my Windows Vista when I found out that my Task Manager is disabled. Must be a spyware or something, or maybe it’s because it’s my fault that I let somebody use my Laptop. But after booting up yesterday I found out it was disabled. SO if you have problems like these your in luck.

Here’s how to enable it, registry hacking it!

  1. Click the Start Orb -> go to the Run Dialog
  2. On the Run Dialog -> type Regedit
  3. On Regedit go to these values

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System

When you’re on System look for DisableTaskMgr On the right-hand side it’s a 32-bit REG_DWORD value. To change the value just double click on DisableTaskMgr. If you don’t have that, create a 32-bit REG_DWORD with the name DisableTaskMgr (please mind the capitalization).
The values are

  • 1 - Disable task manager
  • 0 - Enable task manager

After changing the values close Regedit and you’re done. It should be working now. No need to reboot.

Another thing Why I need the Task Manager so badly is because I use it to restart my computer, if something wrong happens to my computer ( let’s say a hung application).

  • Hit Ctrl+Alt+Del and click on Task Manager.
  • Hit Ctrl+Shift+Esc to bring up Task Manager

On the Task Manager, go to the processes list to restart a hung process in, you even click on Shutdown \ Restart to restart your computer.

{ 1 trackback }

PC EXTREME » Blog Archive » Enable the Missing Show Hidden Files and Folders
10.12.07 at 11:14 pm

{ 2 comments… read them below or add one }

Nick 08.29.08 at 9:12 pm

thanks a lot mate, i was really confused on why it would be grayed out but this fixed it straight away
many thanks

james bor 07.22.09 at 10:34 am

Thanks very much for that, am a happy man now

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