How to Remove "Internet Explorer (64-bit)" Shortcut from Windows 7 Start Menu
I am looking for a way of removing the "Internet Explorer (64-bit)" shortcut from the 'Start\All Programs' folder in a Windows 7 image.
Our customer wants us to remove the shortcut from our image which we are creating using MDT.
We have tried using Group Policy Preferences to delete the icon but have had no success.
Any ideas would be gratefully received.Jonathan Conway | My blog: Conway's IT Blog | Twitter:
jonconwayuk | Linkedin:
Jonathan Conway
MCITP: Enterprise Administrator MCP MCSE 2003 MCTS SCCM 2007, Windows 7 Config & Deploying VCP
May 21st, 2012 9:17am
That's what I'm trying to assertain as part of finding a solution to this.
The shortcut is there by default when you install 64-bit Windows and I've tried removing it from "Default" user but that doesn't resolve the problem. So it looks like it is created by Windows Setup.Jonathan Conway | My blog: Conway's IT Blog | Twitter:
jonconwayuk | Linkedin:
Jonathan Conway
MCITP: Enterprise Administrator MCP MCSE 2003 MCTS SCCM 2007, Windows 7 Config & Deploying VCP
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May 21st, 2012 9:54am
Hi,
How about
prevent Internet Explorer from being pinned to Taskbar and Start Menu. You can try modify related registry to make Internet Explorer unavailable for pinning to the taskbar or for inclusion
in the Start menu's MFU list.
More detail, you can refer this article:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd378459(VS.85).aspx#exclusion_lists
Hope that helps.
Regards,
Leo
Huang
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May 21st, 2012 10:38pm
Hi,
How about
prevent Internet Explorer from being pinned to Taskbar and Start Menu. You can try modify related registry to make Internet Explorer unavailable for pinning to the taskbar or for inclusion
in the Start menu's MFU list.
More detail, you can refer this article:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd378459(VS.85).aspx#exclusion_lists
Hope that helps.
Regards,
Leo
Huang
TechNet Subscriber Support
If you are
TechNet Subscription user and have any feedback on our support quality, please send your feedback
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Leo Huang
TechNet Community Support
Thanks for your response but I've already seen that article. I'm afraid this isn't the issue - the taskbar has the 32-bit shortcut for Internet Explorer which we want to keep (i.e. we have no requirement to remove the taskbar item) and the 64-bit
shortcut on the Start Menu isn't an MFU, it's a proper shortcut on the root of the "Start\All Programs" menu.Jonathan Conway | My blog: Conway's IT Blog | Twitter:
jonconwayuk | Linkedin:
Jonathan Conway
MCITP: Enterprise Administrator MCP MCSE 2003 MCTS SCCM 2007, Windows 7 Config & Deploying VCP
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May 22nd, 2012 4:10am
Hi,
I am trying to involve someone familiar with this topic to further look at this issue.
Regards,
Leo
Huang
TechNet Subscriber Support
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May 22nd, 2012 10:24pm
Hi Jonathan,
Please have a test with following steps, thanks for your time.
Delete the following to prevent the 64bit shortcuts from being created:
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\>{26923b43-4d38-484f-9b9e-de460746276c}\Stubpath
Delete the following to prevent the 32bit shortcuts from being created:
HKLM\Software\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\>{26923b43-4d38-484f-9b9e-de460746276c}\Stubpath
Best Regards,
Kevin NiPlease remember to click Mark as Answer on the post that helps you, and to click Unmark as Answer if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.
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May 23rd, 2012 5:43am
Hi Jonathan,
Please have a test with following steps, thanks for your time.
Delete the following to prevent the 64bit shortcuts from being created:
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\>{26923b43-4d38-484f-9b9e-de460746276c}\Stubpath
Delete the following to prevent the 32bit shortcuts from being created:
HKLM\Software\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\>{26923b43-4d38-484f-9b9e-de460746276c}\Stubpath
Best Regards,
Kevin Ni
Please remember to click Mark as Answer on the post that helps you, and to click Unmark as Answer if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.
I'd seen an article with this one before and when we tried the 64-bit key we found it caused issues with the 32-bit shortcuts! In the end we had to revert as the 64-bit key removed all of the IE9 entry points on the machine.Jonathan Conway | My blog: Conway's IT Blog | Twitter:
jonconwayuk | Linkedin:
Jonathan Conway
MCITP: Enterprise Administrator MCP MCSE 2003 MCTS SCCM 2007, Windows 7 Config & Deploying VCP
May 23rd, 2012 9:05am
Hi Jonathan,
Could you please refer to following links for reference:
Pin Items to the Start Menu or Windows 7 Taskbar via Script
http://blogs.technet.com/b/deploymentguys/archive/2009/04/08/pin-items-to-the-start-menu-or-windows-7-taskbar-via-script.aspx
How To: Customize the Windows 7 Start Menu and Taskbar Using unattend.xml
http://blogs.technet.com/b/askcore/archive/2010/03/16/how-to-customize-the-windows-7-start-menu-and-taskbar-using-unattend-xml.aspx
Thanks.
Kevin NiPlease remember to click Mark as Answer on the post that helps you, and to click Unmark as Answer if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.
Free Windows Admin Tool Kit Click here and download it now
May 30th, 2012 6:44am
Hi Jonathan,
Could you please refer to following links for reference:
Pin Items to the Start Menu or Windows 7 Taskbar via Script
http://blogs.technet.com/b/deploymentguys/archive/2009/04/08/pin-items-to-the-start-menu-or-windows-7-taskbar-via-script.aspx
How To: Customize the Windows 7 Start Menu and Taskbar Using unattend.xml
http://blogs.technet.com/b/askcore/archive/2010/03/16/how-to-customize-the-windows-7-start-menu-and-taskbar-using-unattend-xml.aspx
Thanks.
Kevin Ni
Please remember to click Mark as Answer on the post that helps you, and to click Unmark as Answer if a marked post does not actually answer your question. This can be beneficial to other community members reading the thread.
Hi Kevin.
I've seen both of these articles before unfortunately. They are both focused on "adding" items as opposed to removing them.<o:p></o:p>
I guess what I'm really looking for is someone who has actually accomplished what I am trying to achieve and who can demonstrate exactly how they did it.<o:p></o:p>
So far I am starting to think that this might not be possible to do.Jonathan Conway | My blog: Conway's IT Blog | Twitter:
jonconwayuk | Linkedin:
Jonathan Conway
MCITP: Enterprise Administrator MCP MCSE 2003 MCTS SCCM 2007, Windows 7 Config & Deploying VCP
May 30th, 2012 9:08am
Jonathan,
did you ever get this worked out? what problems were you having using Group Policy Preferences? how did you have it set up? i don't see that it initially deletes the shortcut when a user logs in to a machine for the first time, probably because the
shortcut is created after the group policy preferences are run. but at the next refresh in ~90 minutes it should delete it, right?
nobody's mentioned running a good old login script to delete the shortcut. i think login scripts run last but i could be wrong.
del /F /Q "C:\Users\%USERNAME%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Internet Explorer (64-bit).lnk"
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August 14th, 2012 3:23pm
Hi @ all!
Just copy the string from
HKLM\Software\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\>{26923b43-4d38-484f-9b9e-de460746276c}\Stubpath
to
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\>{26923b43-4d38-484f-9b9e-de460746276c}\Stubpath
or modify the last one as followed: "C:\Windows\SysWOW64\ie4uinit.exe -UserIconConfig"
Roman.
August 20th, 2012 9:52am
I just did it using group policy preferences
User Configuration, Preferences,Windows Settings, Files
Create a new file and for the action select Delete and for Delete Files use this %ProgramsDir%\Internet Explorer (64-bit).lnk
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September 21st, 2012 1:52pm
This does really work. Just be patient with the initial log in. The deletion of the 64bit link only happens after the second or subsequent log in.
Thanks for the find richmond132!
Cheers
~D
October 25th, 2012 11:00am
I have used small vbs script for that.
On Error Resume Next
dim filesys
Set objNetwork = CreateObject("WScript.Network")
Set filesys = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
strUserName = objNetwork.UserName
strFilePath = "C:\Users\" & strUserName & "\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Internet Explorer (64-bit).lnk"
filesys.CreateTextFile strFilePath, True
If filesys.FileExists(strFilePath) Then
filesys.DeleteFile strFilePath
End If
WScript.quit
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October 25th, 2012 12:38pm