Windows Vista: Explorer opens folders in a new window
Recently, Vista started opening folders in a new window even though "Open each folder in the same window" was selected in the folder options. Obviously something had changed but I didn't know what. There were more indications that something was wrong, including:
- Explorer opens folders in a new window, ignoring the folder options setting.
- The Windows flag on C: is gone.
- DVD-drives are labelled as CD-drive.
- Trying to access a CD/DVD results in a Format blank disc dialog box.
Searching the internet resulted in heaps of complaints about the new window issue so finding the right fix wasn't easy. It turned out that Internet Explorer 8 was the culprit. So there you have solution #1: uninstall IE8. Actually, that's not a solution so I wasn't satisfied 
Another solution that I encountered a couple of times suggested to launch IE8 as administrator. Several users reported that this method fixed the problem, but it certainly didn't fix it for me.
Eventually, I found a comment on the IEBlog with a list of 19(!) steps to fix it. Fortunately, and as noted in the comment too, step #11 seems to be the critical one. I was able to solve all issues mentioned above by doing this:
- Open a command prompt as administrator (right click -> Run as Administrator)
- Type: regsvr32 actxprxy.dll
- Click OK in the popup window.
- Reboot
And Vista was back to its normal self. YMMV!
May 29th, 2009
That worked a charm. I too had tried plenty of solutions before this one. Thanks for this.
May 29th, 2009
That works great!
Thanx.
June 6th, 2009
After many hours of searching and trying other fixes I came across this fix. It worked perfectly! Thank You
June 10th, 2009
LOL pfft, what fraking noobs are making IE8? Honestly, what kind of bugged crap is that; did they not notice that, or think…yeah that’s cool.
sigh. IE8 uninstalled, and never install again.
I only did it because it was in the updates, using FX btw.
June 10th, 2009
… and thank you very much for figuring this out.
June 10th, 2009
great! thank you very much!
June 18th, 2009
Hey man, thanks a lot. Running IE8 as Administrator worked perfectly. No restart, nothing.
[WORDPRESS HASHCASH] The poster sent us ‘0 which is not a hashcash value.
June 19th, 2009
This helped me alot! Thank u!
June 22nd, 2009
For anyone else having this problem this is the only thing that worked for me. MAKE SURE YOU RUN THE CMD AS SYSTEM ADMIN OR IT WILL NOT WORK. You can find it in Windows/System32/cmd.exe – Thank you for the fix! Solved all of my problems… even more of the reason I hate IE.
July 1st, 2009
Many thanks,
This fixed it for me.
July 27th, 2009
Genius mate cheers!
That was so nippy. How on earth did that get past testing? It started with me after I UPDATED WINDOWS THROUGH WINDOWS. Why on earth would anyone want 50 open folders all over their screen??
Come to think of it why would anyone want their pc to spend a lifetime preloading files you will never use… Vista is a bug ridden mess I am forever searching the net for solutions to “simple” things.
Thanks to people like you who take the time to find and publish solutions.
Cheers.
August 3rd, 2009
Thank you! I found this by google, and I’m glad I did. I’m so glad this is fixed. Urge to kill…falling…falling.
August 8th, 2009
Bedankt Hans! Had het ook zitten na IE8-installatie. Voor ‘t eerst, hoewel het zeker niet de eerste keer was dat ik IE8 installeeerde via Windows Update.
August 13th, 2009
I spent hours and hours to figure out this thing! And it is so simple (If you know
what to do)Many Thanks
August 24th, 2009
I have the same problem with Win 7. Unfortunately, this solution didn´t work for me….
Any other ideas ?
September 7th, 2009
thanks alot
[WORDPRESS HASHCASH] The poster sent us ‘0 which is not a hashcash value.
October 2nd, 2009
kick ass, this helped
October 26th, 2009
Worked for me in Win 7!
Tnx
[WORDPRESS HASHCASH] The poster sent us ‘0 which is not a hashcash value.
January 28th, 2010
Thank you! I love you, man!
January 28th, 2010
Perfect solution after trying many other things.
Why doesn’t Bill G. solve this?
February 3rd, 2010
My fix was to edit the properties in explorer! I had wanted expoler to open up in computer rather than libraries! I did the target change and thats when I started having problems! to fix it I just removed root out! final should look like this >>> %SystemRoot%\explorer.exe ,::{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}
That was the ticket, quick and easy!!
February 11th, 2010
Wow I must truly say that you are the FN man, I have tried deleting reg files, changing reg default, some jack ass from one other site suggested it in his forum of the same problem and none of it worked even tried system restore haha that didn’t work either. But here you are and now my computer is back to normal. Oh just to mention the jpeg thumbnails were not visible as inside the folders.
Super easy and it works THANK YOU VERY MUCH!