Control Panel - two Add/Remove Programs?

[Kate]

Win XP Home SP3 fully-updated
I visited Control Panel today for the first time in quite a while and
noticed that I now have two Add/Remove Program icons, both of which
are identical and work normally . Can anyone tell me how this might
have happened, please, and if it is possible to remove one of them
safely and easily?

Many thanks
Kate

 

[Elmo]

Win XP Home SP3 fully-updated
I visited Control Panel today for the first time in quite a while and
noticed that I now have two Add/Remove Program icons, both of which
are identical and work normally . Can anyone tell me how this might
have happened, please, and if it is possible to remove one of them
safely and easily?

Many thanks
Kate

This might work.. look for more than one copy of
C:\WINDOWS\system32\appwiz.cpl

Delete one.

 

[Kate]

Win XP Home SP3 fully-updated
I visited Control Panel today for the first time in quite a while
and
noticed that I now have two Add/Remove Program icons, both of which
are identical and work normally . Can anyone tell me how this might
have happened, please, and if it is possible to remove one of them
safely and easily?

Many thanks
Kate

PS : I see that I have two appwiz.cpl files in Windows/system32, one
of which is appwiz(2).cpl. I tried renaming this to appwiz(2)OLD.cpl,
but although the icon in Control Panel has changed, the darn thing
still works properly! Whilst in the system32 folder, I noticed that
there are many files with the same names but with (2),(3) or (4) even,
after them...

Kate

 

[Olórin]

PS : I see that I have two appwiz.cpl files in Windows/system32, one
of which is appwiz(2).cpl. I tried renaming this to appwiz(2)OLD.cpl,
but although the icon in Control Panel has changed, the darn thing
still works properly! Whilst in the system32 folder, I noticed that
there are many files with the same names but with (2),(3) or (4) even,
after them...

Kate

If "appwiz(2).cpl" still functioned as the normal Control Panel applet, then
changing the "(2)" to "(2)OLD" isn't likely to change much; try changing the
whole name to, say, appwiz(2)cpl.old instead.

 

[SC Tom]

PS : I see that I have two appwiz.cpl files in Windows/system32, one
of which is appwiz(2).cpl. I tried renaming this to appwiz(2)OLD.cpl,
but although the icon in Control Panel has changed, the darn thing
still works properly! Whilst in the system32 folder, I noticed that
there are many files with the same names but with (2),(3) or (4) even,
after them...

Kate

Rename it to appwiz(2).old instead. You also might want to scan with an
anti-virus and anti-malware scanner.

SC Tom

 

[Bill Sharpe]

Win XP Home SP3 fully-updated
I visited Control Panel today for the first time in quite a while and
noticed that I now have two Add/Remove Program icons, both of which
are identical and work normally . Can anyone tell me how this might
have happened, please, and if it is possible to remove one of them
safely and easily?

Many thanks
Kate

If both of the cpl files work you can just delete the second one. I'd
suggest completely deleting it (shift + Del), not trying to send it to
the recycle bin itself <grin>

Or rename the extension as others have suggested, then, when satisfied
that the remaining cpl file still works properly, delete the extraneous
cpl file.

Bill

 

[Kate]

If both of the cpl files work you can just delete the second one.
I'd suggest completely deleting it (shift + Del), not trying to send
it to the recycle bin itself <grin>

Or rename the extension as others have suggested, then, when
satisfied that the remaining cpl file still works properly, delete
the extraneous cpl file.

Bill

Thanks for the replies. I renamed the second file, using .old instead
of .cpl, as suggested, and one of the thumbnails has gone but the
other one still works, asmuch as the "list is populated". I shall run
a virus check, just in case.

IIRC, one of the ways in which XP differs from, say, Win98, is that
when a program wants to install a file which other programs need,
instead of overwriting the existing one - and maybe rendering a
program inoperable because it is a different version - XP allows more
than one version to be installed. Could this be why I have so many
files with the same names, but with numbers after them, as I described
in my second post? It wouldn`t explain why I had two Add/Remove
Programs, though.

Thanks again
Kate

 

[Kate]

Thanks for the replies. I renamed the second file, using .old
instead
of .cpl, as suggested, and one of the thumbnails has gone but the
other one still works, asmuch as the "list is populated". I shall
run
a virus check, just in case.

IIRC, one of the ways in which XP differs from, say, Win98, is that
when a program wants to install a file which other programs need,
instead of overwriting the existing one - and maybe rendering a
program inoperable because it is a different version - XP allows
more
than one version to be installed. Could this be why I have so many
files with the same names, but with numbers after them, as I
described
in my second post? It wouldn`t explain why I had two Add/Remove
Programs, though.

Thanks again
Kate

In answer to my own query, having checked the Properties of the
multiple files (.dlls for the most part) and noted the versions, the
last four numbers _are_ different.

Kate