Windows XP displays several system folders in the startmenu with no obvious way of removing them from it. System folders are for instance the MyDocuments, MyMusic and MyPics folders. They are displayed even if you do not use those folders at all and no files are located in them.
A convenient way to get rid of those system folders is to edit the Windows Registry. Hit Windows R, type regedit and press enter. Now navigate to the Registry key HKEY_CURRENT_USER \Software \Microsoft \Windows \CurrentVersion \Explorer \Advanced and look at the right pane. You probably find lots of registry keys in that folder, all entries starting with Start_Show are of importance.
Just double-click an entry and set its value to 0 if you do not want to display it in the startmenu anymore. It could be that some entries are not existing, take a look at the following table and add those keys as Dwords if they are missing.
- Start_ShowControlPanel
- Start_ShowHelp
- Start_ShowMyComputer
- Start_ShowMyDocs
- Start_ShowMyMusic
- Start_ShowMyPics
- Start_ShowNetConn_ShouldShow
- Start_ShowPrinters
- Start_ShowRecentDocs
- Start_ShowRun
- Start_ShowSearch
- Start_ShowSetProgramAccessAndDefaults
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just a word. like you said, “System folders are for instance the MyDocuments, MyMusic and MyPics folders.”
a much better way than editing registry is,
right click at Start menu -> Properties -> Start menu tab -> Customize… -> Advanced tab -> Start menu item box and search for the folders.
you can tick ‘Don’t display this item’ for MyDoc, MyMusic, MyPics folders.
it would be troublesome if the person wants back the folder after he/she edits the registry. :)