Hey,

I have been using XP for about a year now and have never had a problem. Out of the blue yesterday i tried to open my documents, and it opens another window, with this " search companion' in it and i have to search for the files that are in that folder. And it is with any folder I try and open. I dont about you but i dont want to have to search for files when i can easily access them with two quick clicks of the mouse button. I have absolutley no idea why it is doing this and I have tried absolutley everything (i can think of) to get rid of this annoying as hell 'search companion'. PLEASE help!!

Thanks,

Rossy 28

Is it MICROSOFTS search companion, or one that trys to get you to buy something with pop ups??

Nah its Microsofts Search Companion. The one with the stupid little animated character.

Start the registry editor by clicking START>RUN then type:Regedit

 

Go to subfolder HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT \ Directory \ shell

 

And subfolder HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT \ Drive \ shell

 

Edit the default value to be 'explorer' or 'none'

 

That should fix it all back to normal then.

Hey sweet, thanks for that mate. Hope I dont get it again.

thanks again,

Rossy.

i've lost the animated characters in search companion, except the wizard. i tried to follow your advice and ran regedit but i can;t get to "directory" or shell. too much of a novice, i guess.

any further advice. i miss the little animated dog in search companion

Personally, I HATE the dog and keep it off, I also turn on advance search, what can I say, I'm a power user. But anyway, to answer the question about the dog. In the image below, I have circled where you need to click to "TURN ON THE ANIMATED CHARACTER" as well as set your search box up the way you like.

 

If you like all the pretty special effects over just getting it done, then keep the dog... myself I'd rather have what I'm looking for in a split second. Indexing service ON, animated character OFF, Advance search options ON.

 

But then, thats just me.

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thank you very kindly for your response greatly appreciated

all is well i discovered that my new compaq has a repair for windows without formatting tks again