Registry Problem (I think)

[Clicker]

I'm using Windows XP and I believe that at some point in the past my registry got corrupted. I don't know how long ago because the effect of the corruption is very subtle. It only occurs when I do a very specific and unusual task.

First, I open the Start menu, then I go to 'All Programs', then I go to one of the program folders. I right-click on one of those folders so that a smaller menu pops up like this:

Open

Explore

Delete

Rename

Sort by Name

Properties

If I click on Open, the folder is supposed to open as a new window instead of a pop up menu. This makes it easier to edit its contents, but a strange thing happens when I try it.

Suppose I do it with the Accessories folder. Instead of directly opening, it pops up a dialogue box called 'Move Items' and says "Select the place where you want to move 'Accessories'. Then click the Move button." It gives me a tree of folders with My Computer as the root for me to choose a folder to move 'Accessories' to, and if I do choose a folder and click 'Move' then it really will move.

Fortunately, if I click cancel then it will pop up another dialogue box, almost identical, but this time asking for a location to copy 'Accessories' to, and if I cancel that, it will finally open the 'Accessories' folder.

It is as if Windows has gotten the wrong action associated with 'Open' for Start menu folders. This does not happen when I open folders by right-clicking when they are not on the Start menu. Even if the folder is the same folder that appears on the Start menu but I access it another way, it still will not reporduce the effect.

I have had this strange behaviour for a long time and thought nothing of it. I've probably had it long before I noticed it, as well. But recently I have found that I program that I want to use is causing the same behaviour. When it tries to open certain files it produces the same dialogue boxes and the same effect, moving, copying, or finally opening if I cancel all else. I believe that the program is also using the registry to do the opening, because it automatically chooses the correct application to open the file.

What part of the registry is corrupted? Where do I look? Should I use regedit to fix it, or a different tool? I have set a system restore point, so I feel confident that I can make a modification to a file association in the registry without messing things up too badly. Am I correct in guessing that this would be somewhere in the 'classes' area of the registtry?

Or is this not a registry problem at all?

[dagwoood]

Hello Clicker and welcome to WF :)

I had the same problem, I stumbled across this error when I selected the play all option in my music folder and was greeted with the move to dialogue box.

In my case it was caused by I had added "Copy to" and "Move to" to my context menu. I did this using the registry tweaks found in RegSeeker, and when I removed the tweaks it fixed the problem :)

If you've modified your context menu and have added copy to and move to, try undoing the modification.

This article led me to realise what my problem was and it also gives the location of the registry entries that were causing the problem: http://windowsxp.mvps.org/movetocontext.htm

HTH, dagwoood.

[Clicker]

Hello Clicker and welcome to WF :)

Thanks dagwood! I might not be here for long, because your advice was exactly what I needed. I tried it and I got immediate and total results. A registry editing isn't so scary!

I did have copy to and move to in my context menu, but I don't know how they got there. Now they are gone and everything is happy.