The option which specifies 'Always use the selected program to open this kind of file' tick box is greyed out in windows 7

[PuppETR]

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I have come here with a strange problem with my windows 7. The problem is that in my windows 7 there are several programs that require me to select the program manually whether to open in which format. Many programs open up just by double clicking. While there are some programs take the example of the notepad files whenever i want to open the notepad file instead of the showing the sign of starting up. It shows me the list of programs that i have to select in order to open. So i have to select notepad from the list of programs and when i go to select the option "Always use the selected program to open this kind of file" it is always grayed out. So i don't have any option than to select the program from the list every time manually. So do you all have any idea why is this happening. Please do let me know if you have any idea.

[DotNetUser]

Well the solution for this is quite simple what you have to do is to go to the control panel and in the control panel select the default programs. After that go to the Associate a file type or protocol with a program link. On going there select the select the program type and then select the program type. Check for the list of programs that are available. If you do not find any then go to the other programs and find it. If still you don't get it then try browsing for that particular program and search where the .exe file is located. So hope this solution works for you. Just try with this solution and let me know if it works for you.

[PuppETR]

Hey sorry to say but this did not helped me much with my problem. What i want to say is that by just simply highlighting the files with the .exe files does not helps. Actually i had a rough idea about this solution specified above. It has not given me the desired result. Any suggestions that you have that will help me with the issue. So please do specify some other solution. If you are having then. Please do reply fast.

[Badrunath]

Well i have another solution for you. Do follow these steps and your check box will be live again. What you have to do is
1) Go to the command prompt and type regedit and press enter.
2) Go to this particular location HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\policies\Explorer
3) after going there do a right click on the nofileassociation.
4) Change the value from 1 to 0.
5) reboot the system.
Now you can see the changes. Hope this solution works for you.

[MahaGuru]

I have this strange solution which i am going to share it with you. What the exact scenario was that i had tried with each and every solution in the book but it did not help me much. So what i did was while opening the particular file i selected the word pad as a program. Since it was not there in the list. So i think when i tried opening the file. I clicked on the open as and there it showed me the tick box and it was not even grayed. So i selected it and clicked notepad as the option. So just try i was able to get it.

[rtwigg]

None of the solutions work for my Acer Aspire One netbook. I upgraded from Windows 7 Starter to Windows 7 Home Premium. I installed Microsoft Office 2010 Plus. Neither my other laptop with Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit nor my HP tower with Windows 7 Home Premium 32 bit has the .theme or .themepack file associations or the registry key mentioned. There must be some other solution.