7.1. Policies vs. Preferences

One of the most heralded benefits of moving away from your old Windows NT 4–based System Policy is the nonpersistence of the Registry changes using Group Policy. Every Windows NT 4 System Policy change was persistent. When you enabled a System Policy, it stayed turned on until you set an explicit policy to turn it off. You couldn't just delete the policy and have the setting go away, as is the case with today's Group Policy engine. If you used Windows NT System Policy, you had to fight the same problem over and over.

Versions of Windows since Windows 2000 utilize a new model for policies. Microsoft created special locations in the Registry for Windows 2000, aptly named Policies. Microsoft documentation states that ...

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