Editing the Registry is perfectly safe so long as you follow four simple rules;
1) Make sure that the proposed edit is from a reliable source. Someone who makes a living telling people how to setup/adjust/tweak their computers will either give good advice that won’t mess up your system or find their reputation tarnished enough that they will be forced into a different vocation in short order. So if one of the writers for Maximum PC suggests a Registry edit, odds are that it’s a more reliable edit than one proposed by some random stranger who knows more about the mating habits of Australian sheepdogs than about computers.
2) If you don’t know what it is and you aren’t explicitly instructed to mess with it, just leave it alone.
3) Before you commit the change by saving it, double-check that you typed exactly what you are supposed to.
4) After you double-check but before you commit the change by saving it, check one last time to make sure that you typed exactly what you are supposed to.
While editing the Registry is potentially dangerous, every problem caused by editing the Registry are the result of violating one of those rules. Maybe they overestimated the credentials of some guy named “Nerdgasm69” on some obscure Reddit blog, maybe they made a typo, or maybe they decided to be adventurous and make up their own instructions, but one way or another they broke at least one of those rules and reaped the consequences.