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Does anyone know how to set file associations back to default on windows 8. Currently the file extention "idx" is opening with "winRar" & i want to reset it back to "unknown program".

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3 Answers 3

Reset to default
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Instead of changing it in the registry you can use the command line

Open an elevated command prompt (run cmd.exe as administrator) and type the following command:

assoc .idx=

No need to reboot.

edit:: You can check beforehand with assoc .idx (without the equal-sign) if it is in the system-wide associations. If it is not, you added the association yourself at user-level. This is handled differently per Windows version but Windows 7/8 stores it in the following: (grrrr. for this one you do still need regedit.exe)

  1. Open the registry editor by pressing Win + R and typing regedit.
  2. Go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\ and remove the following keys (at the left): HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.idx
    HKCU\Software\Classes\.idx
    HKCU\Software\Classes\idx_auto_file
  3. Reboot.

The reboot is not strictly necessary (it works directly) but it updates the icons in the explorer.

This removes all associations with .idx, including previous ones assigned by other programs, and gives you back the prompt "Windows can't open this file / What do you want to do".

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  • Was this supposed to do something because it did nothing... I typed in that command & idx files still open as winRar file.
    – Ryan
    Sep 25, 2013 at 0:35
  • If you manually added this association your correct that assoc can't find it. I added information to my answer for this case.
    – Rik
    Sep 25, 2013 at 8:04
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I don't know of an way to do this through a menu or the Control Panel, but I've done it by editing the registry.

  1. Open the registry editor by pressing Win + R and typing regedit.
  2. Just to be safe, back up your registry. Click File -> Export, and save the .reg file somewhere in case you need to restore the registry later.
  3. Go to HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT and find the key for the file extension, e.g. .idx.
  4. Click this key (don't expand it, click it) and delete the Default value within it.
  5. Reboot.
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Does WinRAR automatically assotiates the extensions? Try unchecking .idx extension in options menu of WinRAR, and try with command prompt again.

If it doesn't work, use registry as mentioned above.

Since programs have live component that updates settings and registry does not.

Besides, i would recommend (NOT force you to use!) 7zip as a better alternative.

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