Windows

Add The Pin To Start Menu Option To Folders In Vista

Posted by on Oct 24, 2007 | 3 Comments

A pinned program is one that is manually added to the Start Menu and remains there until you remove it. For those programs you access on a daily basis, one of the options you have for making them faster to open is to pin them to the Start Menu. You can pin a program to the Start Menu by right clicking the specific program and selecting the option to Pin to Start Menu. Keep in mind though that if multiple users share the computer, the program will only appear as a pinned program for the user who is currently logged on.

What if you want to pin a folder that you regularly access to the Start menu? If you right click a folder, the ‘Pin to Start Menu’ option is not available. To add this option for folders, you need to make a small change to the registry as described below.

  1. Open the Registry Editor.
  2. Browse to the following location: HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Folder\shellex\ContextMenuHandlers\.
  3. Create a new key called: {a2a9545d-a0c2-42b4-9708-a0b2badd77c8}. Make sure the key has no value.
  4. Close the Registry Editor.

When you right click a folder now, you should see the ‘Pin to Start Menu’ option.

[tags]vista, windows, vista tips, vista help[/tags]

  • Chris

    I’m having a problem, I have Vista Ultimate 64-bit and since I’ve had it it has always allowed me to right-click and select pin to start menu, as I use it a lot, but one day I’m not sure if it’s because of a Windows Update or not, the right-click to pin isn’t there anymore. I’ve tried adding the key to the registry and it still wont work I have tried a program that does this for you too and still no luck any ideas? It just happened out of the blue, I’ve scanned for viruses etc but my pc is clean

  • Chris

    Sorry I didn’t read the post properly, this is about adding folders which aren’t enabled to be pinned by default- lol but if there are any tips for my previous question it would be good :)

  • Paul tan

    Instead of creating something else you can actually drag a folder/icon to the round start menu button. This automatically pins the folder/icon you have dragged to the start menu.