How to Disable/Enable Windows default debugger Dr. Watson

If you haven’t heard it before, you may wonder what is Dr. Watson? Here is a brief explanation:

Dr. Watson for Windows is a program error debugger that gathers information about your computer when an error (or user-mode fault) occurs with a program. Technical support groups can use the information that Dr. Watson obtains and logs to diagnose a program error.

So, that means this debugger will collect information and send to Microsoft for further analysis. But for your testing computer that don’t have internet, or if you feel it’s useless for you anyway, just follow these steps to turn off.

• 1.Go to Start Menu –>> Run and type regedit.exe then press Enter.
• 2.Browse to the following registry. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareMicrosoftWindows NTCurrentVersionAeDebug
• 3.Click the AeDebug key, and then click Export Registry File on the Registry menu. Save the file and remember it.
• 4.Then you can delete the AeDebug key.

That’s it! Whenever any programs crash again, Windows won’t ask you whether you want to send data to Microsoft or not.

If you change your mind and want to enable Dr. Watson back. It’s easy.

• Double-click the file you save in step 3.
• And then go to Start –>> Run –>> cmd.exe
• At the command prompt, type drwtsn32 -i

Have fun playing around Windows!

Source : Microsoft

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