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How Do You Fix Add/Remove Programs When It Leaves Out Apps?

Q: I rely on the Add/Remove Programs control panel to remove unnecessary junk from my hard drive. But I have a bunch of problems with Add/Remove Programs. What's up?

A: Add/Remove can be twitchy. In fact, we've noticed three things that bother the heck out of us.

Problem 1: Windows hides some of its components and won't let us uninstall them.

Solving this one's pretty easy. Although Windows hides the components it doesn't want uninstalled, you can make them visible--and uninstall them--with a couple of quick edits.

1. Go to the C:\WINNT\inf folder and open sysoc.inf.
   
   
2. Scroll to the [Components] section, and in the entry for the program you want to uninstall, remove the word hide but leave the comma that follows it. For instance, to make it possible to remove the fax component, change Fax=faxocm.dll,FaxOcmSetupProc,faxsetup.inf,hide,7 to Fax=faxocm.dll,FaxOcmSetupProc,faxsetup.inf,,7.
   
   
3. Save sysoc.inf.
   
   
4. When you next open Add/Remove Programs, once-hidden Windows Components will be visible.
   
   

Problem 2: I can't install or uninstall Windows Accessories.

The root of this is also in the sysoc.inf file. Open that file, and look for the following entries, deleting hide from these entries so that the section reads:

Games=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,games.inf,,7

AccessUtil=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,accessor.inf,,7

CommApps=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,communic.inf,,7

media_clips=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,mmopt.inf,,7

MultiM=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,multimed.inf,,7

AccessOpt=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,optional.inf,,7

Pinball=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,pinball.inf,,7

MSWordPad=ocgen.dll,OcEntry,wordpad.inf,,7

Save the file and click Add/Remove Windows Components in the Add/Remove Programs window. You should now see Accessories listed.

Problem 3: Some of the entries in Add/Remove Programs don't work.

On occasion, an application leaves behind its Add/Remove entry even though the program itself is deleted. If tidiness is important to you, you can eliminate these dysfunctional items by digging into the Registry. Of course, it won't do the operating system any harm to leave a stray icon in the Add/Remove Programs list. If you feel ambivalent about diddling with the Registry, by all means don't bother with this process. If you aren't certain that you know what you're doing, please get help from a knowledgeable person before you follow these instructions--a wrong move could break your operating system pretty badly.

Select Start, Run, then type regedit and press Enter. Navigate to the following Registry key in the left pane:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall

Add/Remove Programs builds its list from the keys in this folder. By deleting a key here in the right pane, you remove the program from the list. Delete only the key for the programs you've already uninstalled, because if you delete any others you'll never be able to use Add/Remove Programs to uninstall them.