removing Windows Media Player.

How the hell do you get rid of Windows media player? It is really annoying me.

I hate media player. All that stupid bloated skins nonsense, no immediate response to full screen, Doesn't play Real or quicktime(I hate the quicktime player even more), etc.

I am very much a fan of the K-lite codec pack, so I use Media player classic all the time, which is nice and simple, and does everything properly.

Basically, whenever I double-click a movie file, it launches the 'Open with..' dialog, no matter how many times I tell it to ALWAYS OPEN WITH MEDIA PLAYER CLASSIC YOU F&%(*£^ing Arse! It always gives me the option of Windows Media player or Media player classic. So I tried un-installing Media player (From add/remove programs -> Windows components), and even though it's now unticked in the list, and thinks it's un-installed, it still launches the stupid thing.

Amazing considering all the legal BS about M$ being ordered to remove media player from windows altogether...

Bit of a Rant, but any suggestions appreciated.

Nlite rocks.

But obviously you don't want to reinstall just to get rid of it

Have you tried

Add/remove > Add/Remove windows Components > Media Player? (XP only I think)

Really want to avoid the whole windows re-install thing.

I've had it working fine before, it just seems that if you open anything with media player before you install media player classic, it gets its claws in and won't let go.


aaaaaaaaaaaaaaRGH!!!

hmm. I might just try to write a program that intercepts the launch of wmplayer.exe, and launches something else... That would be very useful, and isn't very far removed from some of the sh!t I do at work from time to time.... Although I don't think that would be easy.

I know from past experience that if you delete wmplayer.exe, it just reappears. If you replace it with a renamed version of a better player, it just replaces it again... It really is quite unnecessarily annoying.

Get exactly the same problem...

Anyone know what Vista is like for stuff like this? What with all the antitrust crap M$ has been getting over IE and media player, you'd've thought they'd make them a bit less integrated.... Haven't read anything though.

Missed that, but if it is still in the list you haven't uninstalled it

WMP is easy to get rid of.

If you haven't re-installed Windows for a long time, then you should do it anyway. With nLite you can do amazing level of customization to Windows setup. You should give it a try.

reformat and install linux

Have you try setting widnows defaults. Theres some sort of tab in the add remove programs for this(in XP).

Also if you open up windows explorer then tools, folder options, file type, you can modify what extension uses what program...Maybw you can check it there because its mostly the same as always use this program and set defaults but its a more direct approach...

uh oh! I hope I wonder if its a abnnable offense

Ya gotta change this some and find some avatar...scholl is a b*** right now no time hehe

Nah, everywhere in windows it claims they're associated with media player classic. It just always loads "Windows Mediocre Player" whenever I double-click an .avi file.

All the other extensions work at least now, since I "un-installed" it. They always used to pop up and ask, but they now launch as I would like.