What is a HIV file
Windows computers use a program in order to handle registry information. The reg.exe program saves, loads and deletes this information. The program uses different kinds of registry files and one of them is the HIV file. The content of an HIV file is made up of a so-called “hive”. A hive consists of several keys, including subkeys, and values. This hive contains the saved data used by Windows and programs resp. software installed on the Windows machine. HIV files are used to backup whole groups of registry keys. The file can also load them simultaneously.
HIV files and the data inside are saved in a binary format. Different command prompts can be used to either save hives in an HIV file or load a previously saved hive from an HIV file. Both actions, however, should be taken with caution. Any corruption of the registry caused by the HIV file (or due to an already corrupted HIV file) can have severe consequences for the Windows installation. Especially the setupreg.hiv should not be touched as it handles part of the Windows installer.
Here's a small, but not exhaustive list of programs that can open HIV documents:
- Microsoft Reg (Windows)
