How To Uninstall Windows Media Player 12 on Windows 7?

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How To Uninstall Windows Media Player 12 on Windows 7?

by Keith Dsouza | Translate | Print
Thursday, 12th Feb 2009 | Share

By default Windows 7 has Windows Media Player 12 as the default media player, if you are not happy with the performance of the Media player, you can easily downgrade the Windows Media Player 12 to WMP 11.

wmp-12-now-playing-audio-list

Though the method is not straightforward and you will need to perform a hack uninstall of WMP 12. There are several steps you will need to follow to do this.

Step 1: Download Windows Media Player 11 Installer for Windows 7

Step 2: Type services.msc in Windows 7 search bar and open the services application.

Step 3: Find the Windows Media Player Network Sharing Service and Stop it.

Step 4: You will need to take Ownership of several files which include:

All files in Program Files\Windows Media Player\ folder
All files starting with wmp in System32 folder
wmploc.dll.mui in Sytem32\en-us\ folder

Step 5: Run the Windows Media Player 11 Installer you had downloaded earlier.

Step 6: Type Regedit in Windows 7 search bar and open the registry editor application.

Step 7: Delete following Registry key

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\Setup\Installed Versions

Step 8: Reboot your Windows 7 for the changes to take effect.

That’s it, with these steps you will be able to downgrade WMP 12 and use WMP 11 instead. Want to share any Windows 7 tips? Feel free to contact us with your tips.

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Tags: Hacks And Mods, How To, Tips And Tricks, Windows Media Player, WMP12

Author: Keith Dsouza

Keith is the editor-in-chief and owner of Techie Buzz. Keith is a social networking enthusiast and can be found active on twitter, you can follow Keith on twitter @keithdsouza

Keith Dsouza has written 2736 articles for us.

The author of this post can be contacted at keith@techie-buzz.com

22 Responses so far | Leave Your Comments

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Cekş
February 14th, 2009 at 9:38 am #

Dont work!

Server Execution Failed error

Reply to this comment
Velik
February 17th, 2009 at 10:35 pm #

Didnt work for me, but I did find that there is a procedure for setting up hidden beta features in windows 7 which allow a similar feature for wmp 12. Now my question is how do i get WMP 12 back : (

Reply to this comment
Blake
February 24th, 2009 at 3:37 pm #

Didn’t work for me either. it only crapped up the installation. as for a fix for this, i did a system restore to about a day before and now it works fine. i still wish i had wmp11 back tho because it was more stable for me.

Reply to this comment
Blake
February 24th, 2009 at 3:40 pm #

http://www.winmatrix.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=22459

states that it only works for 32-bit system. this solves the puzzle for me as mine is 64-bit.

Reply to this comment
DenyM
March 4th, 2009 at 10:07 am #

Windows+R
cmd
chkdsk
I think this command is restore windows media player 12…

Reply to this comment
wart0g
July 3rd, 2009 at 1:26 pm #

Side note: Oh, and by the way, this only works for 32-bit operating systems.
Would’ve been nice to know before screwing up WMP 12.

Reply to this comment
Jason Kingsbury
July 16th, 2009 at 2:07 pm #

This is a good tutorial, however once I uninstalled wmp 12 I realised you cant go back – or I don’t know how. IF YOU ARE UNSURE WHETHER YOU WANT TO KEEP WMP 12 OR NOT DO NOT UNINSTALL. Now I have to wait until Wmp 12 is released to reinstall it..

Reply to this comment
Justin
August 15th, 2009 at 2:52 pm #

Is it maybe possible to actually give directions for the title of the article…uninstalling something does not mean to downgrade it. A complete uninstall is more productive considering WMP is basically garbage to begin with

Reply to this comment
Val
September 6th, 2009 at 12:25 pm #

Hey guys! I discovered how to uninstall windows media player 12 from windows 7 without a scratch!!!

1- Go to control Panel
2- Choose programs and feature (not uninstall)
3- CHoose Turn Windows Feature On or Off on the left of the screen
4- Find Media Features
5- Unmark Media Features then press Ok
6- Simply restart, and reinstall media player 11 (or the one you’d like)

(Sorry for my bad English, I’m usually speaking french )

Reply to this comment
Tony Reply:
September 14th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
This works fine on any version. Best recommendation.

Reply to this comment
GBo Reply:
November 29th, 2009 at 12:34 pm
Brilliant!

Reply to this comment
Evaristo Estevez Reply:
December 12th, 2009 at 10:17 am
Thanks for your tip! Invaluable. I hope that I’ll be able now to associate media files with SMPlayer, finally.

(MS really go to great lengths to avoid competition. 1 hour of my weekend time. Multiply this by millions of users…)

Reply to this comment
Persi
September 6th, 2009 at 7:22 pm #

Even it didn’t worked for me. After step 4, while following the step 5 installing the Windows Media Player 11 Installer I got lot off error messages. I ignored all those and after that continued with 6,7,8. But at last the windows media player crashed

Reply to this comment
André Almeida
September 13th, 2009 at 10:32 am #

Between step 6 and 7, you can EXPORT the key, before the deletion, and in the future, you can restore the key too. This solves the problems of “windows media 12 crash”.

Other way is to create a system restore point.

I hope this helps you guys!

Hugs

Reply to this comment
John
December 22nd, 2009 at 8:01 pm #

Also, thanks to the jackals at Microshaft, if you disable Windows Media Player, it also disables Media Center as Media Center is dependant on Media Player.

Reply to this comment
Gerry
January 10th, 2010 at 7:52 am #

Thanks. It works ! WMP 12 is total crap.

Reply to this comment
Danny
January 11th, 2010 at 7:28 pm #

Would it be possible to go even further back and ‘downgrade’ to WMP 10? It’s much better than either 11 or 12. Cheers.

Reply to this comment
Kal Reply:
January 31st, 2010 at 8:05 pm
I totally agree that WMP 10 is by far the best while WMP 11 and 12 really suck.
Unfortunately WMP 10 can be installed only on Win XP 32-bit.

Reply to this comment
amit ranjan
January 15th, 2010 at 12:27 pm #

hey i m using window 7 n all my icons in my desktop starts with window media player ….how i can get rid of it ??
plzzz reply quickly bcz i m facing lot’s of prblm ……
i m thnkful to u …..

Reply to this comment
jelenam92
February 1st, 2010 at 2:25 pm #

I am sorry for asking this, i know it is not a topic, but, still……..
My now playing list doesn’t look like this. It doesn’t have the names of the songs i play. If i want to see all the songs from the list i have to go to the library. How do i change this? I didn’t find it anywhere in the options.
Thanks…….. and sorry……..

Reply to this comment
zyg_b
February 7th, 2010 at 6:38 pm #

“need to take Ownership” – what exactly do you mean by that ? Can you please explaine in a simpler languge ?

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