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csett
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Question
csett asked on

everything on my computer appears and opens as a word document. how can i fix this problem?

all icons on desktop appear as word documents

 

all open as word documents

Jeeped
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Answer
Jeeped replied on
MVP Community Moderator Community Star

I've seen this happen before when upon opening a program through a shortcut (e.g. .LNK file), you are asked what program to open it with. After selecting Word via the Select a program from a list of installed programs, and checking the Always use the selected program to open this type of file, the Word document referenced by the original shortcut opens in Word as it should.

The trouble is that now all shortcuts (e.g. .LNK files) on the desktop or throughout Explorer will want to be opened by Word. This is known as a file association. The same condition could occur if you performed those actions on a .JPG or even an .EXE, but the .LNK explanation is far more likely.

This has happened enough that a small utility has been written to undo the .LNK file association that was created. There is a registry hack to accomplish this, but I recommend the unLNK utility for its ease of use.

An Utility to Unassociate File Types in Windows 7 and Vista

Just use the utility to unassociate the .LNK files. Direction for use are provided on the web page above (the same place to get the utility).

DanielStamatis
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DanielStamatis replied on

I have the same problem except my computer will not run the .exe file either. It keeps giving me the "windows cannot run this file". I downloaded pctuneupmeastro to try and resolve that problem but it wont run that file either. I am at a loss.
Jeeped
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Jeeped replied on
MVP Community Moderator Community Star

I don't know if PcTuneupMaestro is going to do anything at all that is noticeable and has the potential to do a lot of harm. The on-line community seems divided on whether it is just basically useless software and whether it is fraudware/malware. Do some research and make your decision on this one.

If you are experiencing "windows cannot run this file" then you likely have a system corruption or a virus. You might try using System Restore and roll back your system to a point in time where you did not have this trouble. There is also additional information in the following Microsoft KB article,