I thought I would share with you the master icon removal list for File Explorer that I’ve compiled from various sites. All of the articles I’ve come across tend to delete the icons for all user’s, but I’ve found that it is possible to delete some of them on a per user basis by creating the key structure in the HKCU section of the registry instead. You’ll just have to fiddle around with them if you want to try it.
HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\CLSID\{CLSID}\ShellFolder
My biggest bitch by far about Server 2012 is that it doesn’t appear to even be a finished product in regards to Group Policy lockdown procedures. On almost every account, you have to hack the damn registry to get rid of unwanted items from File Explorer not to mention the god damned Ribbon UI which I’m going to do a whole nother post to rant and rave about and explain how to customize/remove icons from it. I’m not going to go into great detail here on how to add them through Group Policy Preferences or anything so if you need to know how to do that, check out some of my other articles where I explain how to do it.
In contrast to most of the article’s online, I’ve spent many hours researching this and found that the values they have you enter for the Attributes key just seemed to be randomly guessed by the user until they found a result that worked, when in reality, all they need to do is turn on the SFGAO_NONENUMERATED bit in the hexadecimal. I concluded this by reading these two articles and poking around the registry looking to see what Microsoft does:
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/bb762589%28v=vs.85%29.aspx
http://www.virtualplastic.net/html/ui_shell.html
In theory, for all of the entries directly below, to hide the icon/shortcut, you should be able to simply find the key(s) named “Attributes” and set the value(s) to “00100000” hexadecimal but I will also include the values I’ve taken from other sites in case I am wrong.
SkyDrive – Original: f08004d Hidden: f09004d
HKCR\CLSID\{8E74D236-7F35-4720-B138-1FED0B85EA75}\ShellFolder
HKCR\Wow6432Node\CLSID\{8E74D236-7F35-4720-B138-1FED0B85EA75}\ShellFolder
Favorites – Original: a0900100 Hidden: a9400100
HKCR\CLSID\{323CA680-C24D-4099-B94D-446DD2D7249E}\ShellFolder
HKCR\Wow6432Node\CLSID\{323CA680-C24D-4099-B94D-446DD2D7249E}\ShellFolder
Network – Original: b0040064 Hidden: b0940064
HKCR\CLSID\{F02C1A0D-BE21-4350-88B0-7367FC96EF3C}\ShellFolder
HKCR\Wow6432Node\CLSID\{F02C1A0D-BE21-4350-88B0-7367FC96EF3C}\ShellFolder
HomeGroup – Original: b084010c Hidden: b094010c
HKCR\CLSID\{B4FB3F98-C1EA-428d-A78A-D1F5659CBA93}\ShellFolder
HKCR\Wow6432Node\CLSID\{B4FB3F98-C1EA-428d-A78A-D1F5659CBA93}\ShellFolder
Libraries – Original: b080010d Hidden: b090010d
HKCR\CLSID\{031E4825-7B94-4dc3-B131-E946B44C8DD5}\ShellFolder
HKCR\Wow6432Node\CLSID\{031E4825-7B94-4dc3-B131-E946B44C8DD5}\ShellFolder
Computer – This one is a little different
Original: There is no Attributes Key
Hidden: Create the key and set it to b094010c
HKCR\CLSID\{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}\ShellFolder
HKCR\Wow6432Node\CLSID\{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}\ShellFolder
In the middle navigation pane, to remove the different folders listed on the top of the page, delete these registry keys:
Music Folder
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\MyComputer\NameSpace\{1CF1260C-4DD0-4ebb-811F-33C572699FDE}
Downloads Folder
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\MyComputer\NameSpace\{374DE290-123F-4565-9164-39C4925E467B}
Pictures Folder
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\MyComputer\NameSpace\{3ADD1653-EB32-4cb0-BBD7-DFA0ABB5ACCA}
Videos Folder
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\MyComputer\NameSpace\{A0953C92-50DC-43bf-BE83-3742FED03C9C}
Documents Folder
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\MyComputer\NameSpace\{A8CDFF1C-4878-43be-B5FD-F8091C1C60D0}
Desktop Folder
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\MyComputer\NameSpace\{B4BFCC3A-DB2C-424C-B029-7FE99A87C641}