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This one starts with a visit to Start Menu / Control Panel / Add or Remove Programs. Items listed under Currently installed programs, are allowed to stay there only on a 'what-has-it-done-for-me-lately' or 'what-might-it-do-for-me-in-the-very -near-future' basis. Pick your deadbeat program, click on Change/Remove and confirm your choice.
After that, you might want to use Windows XP's Search (hold down the Windows-logo key and tap the letter F to start a Search) to locate files and folders left behind by an incomplete uninstall. XP's uninstaller is more thorough than Win98's at removing leftovers, but doing a complete Search is a good way to check for yourself.
Next under the ax are items in Add or Remove Programs / Add/Remove Windows Components. First you'll need to reveal a few items that MS thought best to keep hidden. Here is how:
- Make sure you've exited Add or Remove Programs
- Go to My Computer / Tools menu / Folder Options / View tab
- Scan the list until you see Show hidden files and folders and make sure the little circle next to it is filled with a dot
- Click Apply, then OK
- Start Menu / Run... / type (or copy/paste) "notepad %windir%\inf\sysoc.inf" (without the quotes) and press ENTER
- Look for every instance of the word "HIDE" or "hide" and delete it, taking care not to delete the commas on either side.
- Save the changes and go back into Add or Remove Programs / Add/Remove Windows Components. You'll see more items than are listed by default, not all of which can be removed, but the number of removable options will at least be higher than before editing sysoc.inf.
More on unhiding Windows XP components:
- from "19 Brand-New Windows Tips" at ExtremeTech, item #2 "Remove "Uninstallable" XP Components"
- Step-By-Step: Reclaim Hard-Drive Space (PC World)
- Remove the Clutter Left by Your Windows Installation (PC World)
There is a Trial version of XPLite for Windows XP and 2000. It doesn't have as many teeth as the Pro version but the features that are available, are not simulations-- they actually do remove stuff, and the available features are there to stay-- they don't stop working after a trial period, despite what the program's name suggests. For more on XPLite, read Fred Langa's article on the program, entitled A New Way To Slim Down Windows XP, Including SP2.
Components that XPLite (free version) will remove:
- Accessibility Options
- Accessories
- Games
- Multimedia
- Operating System Options
- Server Components
- System Services
- System Tools & Utilities
For a while I didn't know how to get rid of certain folders in c:\program files. The ones I wanted gone were: Netmeeting, MSN Gaming Zone, Xerox, Movie Maker, and Microsoft Frontpage. But like certain useless relatives, some things just won't get lost, even if you ask nicely. Fortunately however, the folders mentioned above can be made to disappear and not come back. I found the instructions at this url. It was posted by someone named "Dirk-Diggler".
WARNING: Following the steps below may cause "device installer error" messages to appear when clicking on Properties for hardware in Device Manager. See this section.
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"...To delete those annoying folders that Microsoft kindly gave us, you know, the ones we don't want like Xerox and Microsoft Frontpage et-al just follow these simple instructions:-1: Do a search for a file called:-
SFCFILES.DLL
There are actually two of them, one in C:\WINDOWS\system32 and one in C:\WINDOWS\system32\dllcache\test2: Rename both these files to:-
SFCFILES.OLD3: Restart your computer in Safe Mode with Command Prompt
4: To delete the folder "Microsoft Frontpage", Type this:-
RMDIR /S C:\PROGRA~1\MICROS~1
and hit the Enter (Return) key on the keyboard.
You will be asked "Are you sure (Y/N)"
just hit the "Y" key on the keyboard and begin step "4" again but with a different folder address.If you are unsure of the DOS style name of the folder you want to delete, type this:-
DIR /X C:
and hit the Enter key. This will give you the real name and the DOS style equivalent names of all files/folders on the root of C:
You will notice that the "Program Files" folder is called "PROGRA~1"
And if you type:-
DIR /X C:\PROGRA~1
and hit the Enter key on the keyboard, this will give you the files/folders within C:\Program Files.
You will notice the folder "Microsoft Frontpage" is called "MICROS~1"The default address of some of the annoying folders are thus:-
C:\PROGRA~1\MICROS~1 (Microsoft Frontpage)
C:\PROGRA~1\NETMEE~1 (Netmeeting)
C:\PROGRA~1\MOVIEM~1 (Movie Maker)
C:\PROGRA~1\OUTLOO~1 (Outlook Express)
C:\PROGRA~1\XEROX (Xerox)BE AWARE THAT "RMDIR" IS A VERY POWERFUL AND POTENTIALLY DANGEROUS COMMAND.
Renaming SFCFILES.OLD back to SFCFILES.DLL will cause the deleted folders to return. ..."
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As a last warning on the above method, I've inserted a message from a guy named Mike Kinney:
"Your article has users rename sfcfiles.dll to sfcfiles.old. I have a comment about this procedure, I followed your directions and was successful in removing what I wanted to remove and have been running in this mode for about 3 months. I recently purchased an external usb drive (smartdrive firefly) and got errors when I plugged in the drive. After returning several drives and recovering to previous states of xp, I discovered that my issue was the renaming of this file to old. Once I renamed it back and rebooted I had no more error popups, and the firefly showed up under the drive section of the device manager. I am suggesting that you include a postin your article that warns users about this possible issue."