Getting a value (on the right pane) from the registry

I'm trying to get a value from the registry in Windows, which sits under several branches:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\... 

Given the following code:

RegistryKey openSubKey = settings.OpenSubKey开发者_Python百科(
    @"\\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Print\Printers\DefaultSpoolDirectory");

openSubKey.SetValue("printername", "");

Where settings is set to LocalMachine in Microsoft.Win32.Registry.

However, I'd get null after the first line of code. What gives?

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Two mistakes, \HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE doesn't belong there, you should use Registry.LocalMachine instead. And DefaultSpoolDirectory doesn't belong there, it is a value, not a key.

The SetValue() arguments do not look happy either. If you want to add a printer (don't) then you'll need to add a key, not a value.

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try removing "\hkey_local_machine"

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Richard's answer seems correct, but just to inform you a little further, you can access the LocalMachine scope of the registry through the Registry.LocalMachine property - check this MSDN link for details. For an example, try this:

var openSubKey = Registry.LocalMachine.OpenSubKey(
    @"SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Print\Printers");