Unable to modify service status from Services.msc in Windows 7

Recently, I was doing a troubleshooting on one of the Windows 7 PCs and came across this situation. As a part of my troubleshooting steps, I had to check whether relevant service is running or not for that particular program. When I launched services.msc, I found that required services were not running.

I thought it’s very simple; I will double click on service to open its properties box. Within that properties box, I will change Startup Type to Automatic and run service by clicking on Start button. But it wasn’t that easy because options to Start and Startup type were disabled and I could not change them. (I ran Services.msc as an Administrator)

Now, I had to find a way to enable options in Services so that I can start it. To di this, I had to make changes to Registry key. I went through following steps to make necessary changes in Registry to allow me to make amendments in services’ properties box.

• Open Registry as an Administrator (Start > type Regedit in the search box)
• Navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\<Program name>
• Right-click the registry key and choose Permissions.
• Click Advanced, and then click Owner.
• Choose Administrators and check the Replace owner on subcontainers and objects box.
• Exit the permissions dialog and then open it again.
• Click Advanced, then choose Administrators and click Edit…
• Check Allow underneath Full Control, and then click OK.
• Check Replace all child object permissions with inheritable permissions from this object.  Click OK and confirm; exit.

Now, go back to Services.msc and open services’ properties box. You should be able to make changes.

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