When you click the Windows Explorer shortcut which is Pinned to the Taskbar, or when running explorer.exe directly in Windows 7, the following error message may be displayed with text "explorer.exe" in the title bar.
This file does not have a program associated with it for performing this action. Please install a program or, if one is already installed, create an association in the Default Programs control panel.
And using the WinKey + E key sequence causes "Unspecified error" (more…)
If you have a host application that you don’t want to be pinned to the Windows 7 taskbar, you can do so by adding a registry value in the application registration area. By default Windows prevents the following host processes from being pinned to the taskbar.
… and other file names defined in the following registry key in string values HostApps, AddRemoveApps and AddRemoveNames
To remove the Pin to Taskbar (and "Pin this program to taskbar") context menu options for a particular application, use these steps: (more…)
When you generate a System Diagnostics Report using Windows Performance Monitor, it may report that no anti-virus product is installed in the system. Whereas the Windows Security Center or Action Center (in Windows 7) detects the installed anti-virus product and reports its status correctly.
When you insert a DVD media in the drive, right-click on the drive and choose Play from the context menu, the following error may occur.
Windows cannot access the specified device, path, or file. You may not have the appropriate permissions to access the item.
However, you may be able to play DVD movies via the AutoPlay dialog, or by starting Windows Media Player and using the Play menu. This happens if the DVD/Play association setting is missing or incorrect, or is of incorrect value type. The DVD Play verb is stored in this registry key: (more…)
The System File Checker (sfc.exe) is an useful tool that lets you scan the integrity of Windows system files, and repair corrupt or missing system files. Numerous cases have been resolved thus far by running Sfc.exe with the "scannow" parameter. However, there are situations where in a corrupt or missing system file prevents Windows from booting normally, and running Sfc.exe from Windows isn’t possible. In such cases, Sfc.exe can be run offline using two additional parameters, via the Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE) in Windows 7 and Windows Vista. (more…)
I know many folks that use Windows SysInternals Process Explorer to gather information about running processes and their open handles. There is an excellent, but probably unsung tool within Windows 7 called Resource Monitor which can be used to see details of running processes, their associated handles and associated modules (for example, DLL files). Resource Monitor proves to be an useful tool to investigate processes and locked files, and can come in handy especially when you forget to bring your troubleshooting toolkit along when fixing a friend’s PC. (more…)
Changing the file type icons in Windows XP and earlier Operating Systems was a breeze, using the File Types tab in the Folder Options dialog. Unfortunately the File Types tab has been discontinued since Windows Vista and there is no alternate GUI provided to change a file type icon or to customize the right-click menu. Earlier we showed you how to change the file type icon manually using registry edits. In this article, we’ll see how to change a file type icon using the excellent Default Programs Editor utility, which we’ve covered before. (more…)
Is your Windows Sidebar (Windows Desktop Gadgets) crashing after adding a third-party gadget, with the error "Windows Desktop Gadgets has stopped working" or "Windows Sidebar has stopped working" (Windows Vista) at every start? You can stop the offending gadget from loading by editing the Windows Sidebar Gadgets settings file. Here are the instructions, which apply to Windows 7 and Windows Vista. (more…)
When a software installation which uses Windows Installer Package fails, you enable Windows Installer Logging and re-run setup to capture the output to a log file for troubleshooting. This can be done using three ways: using the Registry Editor, using the Group Policy Editor or by running the msiexec.exe command with required parameters.
The first two methods are documented in article How to Enable Windows Installer Logging. The third method uses the msiexec.exe command-line parameter. Here is an example:
This starts the 7-Zip .msi installation (7z465-x64.msi) and records all the results, including verbose output to a log file named mylog.txt located at D:\
Do you find it difficult to type the entire command-line everytime when you need to log application setups? No problem! You can implement this in the context menu for .msi files so that you can launch the installation with logging in a couple of mouse clicks. (more…)
When you click on a URL in Windows Mail/Windows Live Mail, or in the Help and Support Center in Windows 7/Vista PC, the hyperlink may open in different application (say, Microsoft Word) rather than your default web browser. For example, clicking on "What’s new in Windows 7" hyperlink in Windows 7 Help Center opens the Web address in Microsoft Word.
This happens due to incorrect association settings for the http protocol. Use these steps to resolve the problem.
Click Start, Default Programs
Click Set your default programs
Select your web browser (e.g. Internet Explorer)
Click Set this program as default
Click OK.
