Windows 7: Windows Explorer Toolbars

Does anyone know if it's possible to remove the Windows 7 Toolbar? (This isn't in Internet Explorer, it's in Windows Explorer ... it usually has options like Organize, Open, Burn, etc). I'm a hotkeys guy, so I rarely use it and would prefer to have the screen space for other things.

Please advise.

If there is no way to remove it, does anyone know how to access it via hotkeys (vs. just tabbing to it)?

Thanks much.

@pf2300

I share your annoyance with this "feature" . I think its going to take a reg hack that I've not yet found.

The most you can do via mortal powers is turn off the menu:

Menu Bar - Turn On or Off



I'm still looking and will never give up - never surrender!

Raargh

It's actually possible to get rid of the toolbar that has the "Organize" button etc., however so far I haven't found anything to get rid of the Navigation bar portion too.

Hiding the organize bar (Folder band) involves editing a dll with a resource editor. Changing an XML style sheet in the dll. Just do a net search for "shellstyle.dll" and "FolderBandStyle". There are two versions of this, one which makes the bar become visible when the mouse hovers over it (the downside is it often flickers when moving the mouse across), and the other hides it always.

@tweaker;

This sounds interesting! I've never attempted this method. Can you please expand a bit? Would hate to muck things up on my first try.

Thanks,

Raargh

There are various pages and forum threads with instruction on the net, as this hack also works in Vista. For exmaple this.

The latest ResHacker version (from its original homepage) has 64-bit support, reelased a week or so ago. You'd also need to change the ownership of the dll to Administrator (and enable write access) so you can copy the modified dll over it. Always keep a backup of the original dll.

The dll file is normally in use (which prohibits replacing/modifying), so you'd have to kill the explorer.exe process before replacing it. There might be an easier solution to that, I haven't tried it though. Since the dll apparently has a separate version for Aero, it should be possible to switch theme to classic, replace the aero version of the dll and then switch back to Aero. Or if you use classic theme then switch to Aero temporarily to replace the dll.

The hack on askvg.com make it hidden not remove. Hidden makes trouble in Win 7.

For remove: make the line

<if mousefocused="false" mousewithin="false"><Element
padding="rect(0rp,0rp,0rp,-28rp)"/></if>

in

<Element padding="rect(0rp,0rp,0rp,-32rp)"/>


For german User: deskmodder-Wiki

What kind of trouble? (aside from the occasional flickering when mouse passes over, I mentioned before) I've been using it a couple of weeks and haven't notice any other side effect.

Now that I think of it, I only used "<if mousewithin="false">", I skipped the focus part as that indeed was causing a bit of trouble. Aside from the flicker, that has been working just fine though.


To clarify the flickering, what happens is when your mouse passes over the pixel row, over a "hidden" button, where mouse-over would expand the bar, it instantly expands it, and then when the mouse moves away again, it disappears. This looks like a flicker. When I get the time I'll investigate if there is some style sheet tag to specify a delay for the expand.