Windows 7 - Single-Click Mode Point to Select - Enable or Disable

**Brink**

How to Enable or Disable Point to Select using Single-click to Open an Item

Information

This will show you how to enable or disable selecting a item by hovering the mouse pointer over it (point to select) when you have Folder Options set to Single-click to Open an Item in Windows 7.

Note

Credit goes to our member Msafi for finding this and bringing it to my attention.

Warning

A side effect of disabling point to select is that a taskbar icon's thumbnail previews (if using a Aero theme) for it's open window will not display automatically since it cannot be selected automatically anymore.

A workaround for this is to either:

Use the Windows Key + Tand Windows Key + Shift + T shortcut keys to cycle through programs on the taskbar, and press Enter to open the one selected.
Right click and then left click on the taskbar icon twice that has the open window. You will then have a thumbnail preview of the opened window for the taskbar icon.

EXAMPLE: Point to Select Enable and Disabled
NOTE: This is only for when you have the Single-click to Open an Item Folder Option set, and not when you have Double-click to open an item (single-click to select) set.

OPTION ONE

Through a REG File Download

1. To Enable Single Click Point to Select
A) Click on the download button below to download the file below.
Enable_Single-Click_Point_to_Select.reg

B) Go to step 3.

2. To Disable Single Click Point to Select
A) Click on the download button below to download the file below.
Disable_Single-Click_Point_to_Select.reg

3. Click on Save, and save the .reg file to the desktop.

4. Right click the downloaded .reg file and click on Merge.

5. Click on Run, Yes, Yes, and OK when prompted.

6. Log off and log on, or restart the computer to apply the changes.

7. When done, you can delete the downloaded .reg file if you like.

OPTION TWO

Manually Through the Registry

1. Open the Start Menu, then type regedit in the search boxand press Enter.

2. In regedit, go to: (see screenshot below)
Code:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Mouse
3. To Enable Single Click Point to Select
A) In the right pane, double click on MouseHoverHeight. (see screenshot above)

B) Type in 4, then click on OK. (see screenshots below)

C) Repeat steps 3A and 3B for MouseHoverWidth.

D) Go to step 5.

4. To Disable Single Click Point to Select
A) In the right pane, double click on MouseHoverHeight. (see screenshot below step 2)

B) Type in 0, then click on OK. (see screenshots below)

C) Repeat steps 4A and 4B for MouseHoverWidth.

5. Close regedit.

6. Log off and log on, or restart the computer to apply the changes.

That's it,
Shawn

Related Tutorials

**msafi** · 04-04-2010

A possibly undesirable side-effect to this is that taskbar thumbnail preview would be disabled as well.

Personally, I wish the effect didn't spill over to the taskbar thumbnail previews, but I'll continue to use this tweak.

**Brink** · 04-04-2010

Hello Msafi,

It is a unfortunate side effect, but I found a workaround for this is to right click and then left click twice on the taskbar icon that has the open window. You will then have a thumbnail preview of the opened window for the taskbar icon.

**msafi** · 04-04-2010

That's cool.

For me, I can live without the taskbar thumbnails, but the point-to-select feature was too annoying to tolerate.

In case I really needed to see the thumbnails, I can use this mouse clicks workaround or press Win+T and use the arrow keys to move through the icons and see their thumbnails!

I usually just use Alt+Tab. It provides window previews.

**Brink** · 04-04-2010

LOL, I forgot about the shortcut keys. Added. Thank you.

**TomMolyn** · 11-22-2010

If you are sceptical or just dont want to mess with the registry you can do this through the graphical interface.

Single-Click or Double-Click to Open an Item

Step 1
Navigate to the Control panel usualy located under START>CONTROL PANEL

Step 2
Once in the control panel change the drop down menu in the top right corner to "Small Options"

Step 3
Now find the icon that is named "Folder Options" and point and click

Step 4
Once in the folder options window under the General tab find the box that is labeled Click Items as Follows. In this box is an option that says Double Click to Open an Item (single click to select) To the left of this is a circle be sure to click this circle and choose Apply then OK

**Brink** · 11-22-2010

Hello Tom, and welcome to Seven Forums.

That it fine, but you misunderstood what the tutorial is for. This tutorial is to show people how to enable or disable selecting a item by hovering the mouse pointer over it (point to select) when they have Single-click to Open an Item option selected in Folder Options instead.

Windows 7 - Single-Click Mode Point to Select - Enable or Disable

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