Disable video preview in side panel

[Cameron]

When I select a video file, Windows will create a little
preview of it in Explorer's side pane. Frequently,
generating this preview causes Explorer to crash, which is
never fun. I would like to disable these video previews
entirely without having to disable the side panel. I have
worked out a way to disable the previews for individual
folders, by modifying the folder.htt file, but what I
would like is a way to disable them for all folders, all
at once. If there are options related to this in WMP or
explorer, then Microsoft has done a fine job of hiding
them from me. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Guest]

Yeah, preview is really only useful for images.
There's no standard option to disable the media previews
and it was a pain to figure out but it can be done.

1. go to C:\WINNT\Web
2. find the hidden/system file called folder.htt
3. make a backup of this file in case you want to change
it back (call it folderold.htt or someting)
4. Open folder.htt with notepad
5. Delete the line <span id=MediaPlayerSpan>
6. Save your changes and close the file

Now media player wont pop up all the time but image
preview and the side bar will still be there!

 

[Guest]

There are two ways of doing this. One is more complicated and could cause a
lot of problems system wise. The other is relatively simple. But isn't a
hack. So the coolness factor isn't there.
The second way is:
Go to Tools>folder options
Then deselect anything that says *enable web content*

At this point windows will not preview any files. which sucks in that I
would like to see it normaly just not for SPECIFIC file types. MS you
listening? give us a power toy for Win2k/xp (BOTH not just XP) that will let
us enable web content for all but specified file types, and at that
associated only to a folder, so if viewed from a different folder the files
would be previewed.

About the first way: It actually is better than the simple way, look at the
other post.
For convinience sake I copied it to this post too:

Yeah, preview is really only useful for images.
There's no standard option to disable the media previews
and it was a pain to figure out but it can be done.

1. go to C:\WINNT\Web
2. find the hidden/system file called folder.htt
3. make a backup of this file in case you want to change
it back (call it folderold.htt or someting)
4. Open folder.htt with notepad
5. Delete the line <span id=MediaPlayerSpan>
6. Save your changes and close the file

Now media player wont pop up all the time but image
preview and the side bar will still be there!

 

[Guest]

There are two ways of doing this. One is more complicated and could cause a
lot of problems system wise. The other is relatively simple. But isn't a
hack. So the coolness factor isn't there.
The second way is:
Go to Tools>folder options
Then deselect anything that says *enable web content*

At this point windows will not preview any files. which sucks in that I
would like to see it normaly just not for SPECIFIC file types. MS you
listening? give us a power toy for Win2k/xp (BOTH not just XP) that will let
us enable web content for all but specified file types, and at that
associated only to a folder, so if viewed from a different folder the files
would be previewed.

About the first way: It actually is better than the simple way, look at the
other post.
For convinience sake I copied it to this post too.

Yeah, preview is really only useful for images.
There's no standard option to disable the media previews
and it was a pain to figure out but it can be done.

1. go to C:\WINNT\Web
2. find the hidden/system file called folder.htt
3. make a backup of this file in case you want to change
it back (call it folderold.htt or someting)
4. Open folder.htt with notepad
5. Delete the line <span id=MediaPlayerSpan>
6. Save your changes and close the file

Now media player wont pop up all the time but image
preview and the side bar will still be there!