Need to force delete Reg Key

I have a Ricoh card driver that starts a service that is erroring on this install. I uninstalled in Control Panel (it's not listed in Services) but it left keys I was able to delete via a REgedit Search - except for one key which is still generating the error and may be running so it won't let me delete it.

Is there an easy way to force delete this? I tried Safe Mode. I can export the key but what editor do I use to mount and delete it and then will regedit let me reimport and overwrite the problem ControlSet PCI/VEN key?

Yea, it's a bit confusing but Service Control Manager loads/starts both services AND drivers. I think your error message indicates the DRIVER can't be started. You're trying to delete the hardware reference to the device. I think you need to look for the service controller entry that tries to load the driver.

Run Serviwin. Click View->Drivers. See if there's a reference to the driver there. Note: Device, Driver and Service names are only a comment for us humans as far as Windows is concerned. So you may have deleted the Driver name when you searched and deleted Ricoh registry keys. So look if an entry for either the driver name OR the driver's filename.

Yea, probably worth creating a System Restore point first. Search for rimsptsk and delete the Service Control Manager entry under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\ as well as any backups under ControlSet01 and 02.

But as to the hardware reference, I see 5 Ricoh devices in your screen shot. Every sub-key under HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum\PCI that begins VEN_1180 is a Ricoh device.

Rather then hacking the registry, I'd Show Non-Present Devices then look in Device Manager for those 5 Ricoh devices->right click Uninstall. (that MS KB applies to all versions of Windows). If you want, I can also take a look at your Device Manager data. Run the 32 or 64 bit version of DevManView. Select all the entries, Ctl-S to save and be sure to change the SAVE AS type to Tab Delimited text (so i can import it into Excel)

/* EDIT */
In fact, may be best to let me see your Device Manager data first so I can see if there are other drivers or other relevant info involved as well with all these Ricoh devices

The PC is delivered now. I had time to delete the only rimsptsk key found in Registry which might have been a sub-key since it was out on the far right side and not the key itself. Since the owner was downloading pics into ITunes I didn't have a chance to reboot to see if the Ricoh and rimsptsk errors detailed in my first two posts reappeared.

I'm not sure there were any performance problems but the repeat errors at every boot bothered me earlier today when I was culling errors so I had hoped I could get them out before the PC was delivered, and was regediting furiously on the freeway.

From your experience: Do you think these Ricoh keys would appear if there was not any Ricoh card reader on the PC, or could it have been carried over from an image I transferred to the PC from another HP PC I'd done last week? Both had card readers but this PC today had Texas Instruments card controller as only installed Device.

I had uninstalled the RIcol in Control Panel and as you know every other listing for it in Regedit, deleted the rimsptsk file in System 32 drivers and now the only reg key found for it. Is this a state it can be left in, or should I plan to follow up?

If there's no Ricoh card reader on the new PC then i'm certain those device entries are there because of the image.

I looked at those 5 Ricoh devices i saw in your snapshot. Each of those devices is a different type of Ricoh card controller. That makes me guess the old PC had a 5-in-1 Ricoh card reader? That also makes it likely there was more then one driver involved. That said, I still don't see any problem with leaving things as is
> There won't be any appreciable performance hit. (It would only be something we'd probably scrub if it was a home PC belong to one us "purists" :)
> At worst, the event log may continue to show a Service Control Manager error, but techs are used to seeing event log errors that don't indicate any real problem. So i wouldn't worry about it

/* EDIT */
p.s. I didn't think to ask at the time, but in your snapshot in post #3 which key were you trying to delete? It should have been the subkey that starts VEN_1180. If not, not sure, but that might also have been part of your problem

andrew129260 said:

gregrocker said:

and was regediting furiously on the freeway.

And I thought texting while driving was bad.....

Don't mean to offend man but you really should not be doing that while driving.

Glad you (hopefully) got it resolved though.

Not to worry my roommate was driving, to deliver 3 rehabbed PC's and get paid the best E Boston ItAlian meal. Paid in full (and I mean FULL).