Raise your hand if you HATE all those menu items put in your right-click menu (without an option to remove) by Microsoft’s Windows Media Player (WMP)! Raise your other hand if you’ve looked for a way to remove these menu items before, but all you’ve been able to find is years old forum posts that talk vaguely about removing lines from the Registry.
For those of you not following me … right-click on a media file (audio or video).
What I am
looking to get rid of is the following menu items:
- Copy to CD or Device
- Queue-It-Up
- Add to Playlist...
- Play with Media Player
Normally it would be easy to remove an unwanted menu item. Most menu items are setup in the 'File Types' tab of the 'Folder Options' window, accessed from within Windows Explorer by clicking:
Tools > Folder Options
This is the same window where one goes to
customize their media icons by file type.
The problem is that the above items in the 'Context Menu' are setup through 'shell extensions'. Shell Extensions are in-process COM objects which extend the abilities of Windows operating system. Most shell extensions are automatically installed by the operating system, but there are also many other applications that install additional shell extension components. For example, if you install WinZip on your computer, you'll see a special WinZip menu when you right-click on a Zip file. This menu is created by adding a shell extension to the system. If you disable the appropriate shell extension, you won't get these additional menu items.
Now I may not be technically incompetent, but I know better than to go playing with the Registry without knowing exactly what I’m doing.
SOLUTION:
I found a tool to help one get rid of these menu items without screwing up their system:
ShellExView (v1.15 as of the date of this posting)
by Nirsoft
This program is freeware.
See attached file or download at Nirsoft or PCWorld
The ShellExView utility displays the details of shell extensions installed on your computer, and allows you to easily disable and enable each shell extension.
INSTRUCTIONS:
In order to locate and disable the unwanted shell extension item(s):[LIST=1][*]Sort the extensions by the 'Type' column, and look at all 'Context Menu' items. [*]Look for the extension(s) that create the menu you want to disable.
The icon near each item can help to locate the desired shell extension.[*]Highlight the offending extension(s). [*]Right-click the selection, and choose "Disable Selected Items"[/LIST=1]For me the following three (3) shell extensions proved to be the source of the problem entries:
- WMP Add To Playlist Launcher
- WMP Burn Audio CD Launcher
- WMP Play As Playlist Launcher
The more technical out there may notice that these three (3) extensions constitute the whole of the
wmpshell.dll. I suppose that uninstalling this dll may do the same thing as disabling the extensions, but I preferred the safety net of using a GUI, and not incurring other unintended side affects
For those interested in trying this later method, I believe you would go to:
Start > Run
And to uninstall enter
regsvr32 /u wmpshell.dll
If you later with to restore enter
regsvr32 wmpshell.dll
Your media files should now be unburdened from WMP, and as promised ...
… no more “Queue-It-Up†et all.