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Is there a way to add the ability to show previews of FLV files in Windows Explorer under Windows 7?

4 Answers 4

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+50

A much cleaner way to get thumbnails for FLV (as well as MKV and OGV) videos in Windows Explorer is to use the program Icaros. It is made by the person who makes the Shark 007 codec pack, but you don't need to install the codec pack for Icaros to display thumbnails because it includes a built-in decoder.

(Personally, I am really opposed to super-ultra-mega-hyper-codec-packs. I do not like (nor recommend) installing big packages like these because you never really know what they are doing to your system. Even if it is not malware, they usually add clutter and perform modifications that may not be necessary—they tend to be either scripts that automate installing all of the individual components or manual hacks of the main parts of the individual components.)

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    (Incidentally, I just installed the latest version which includes an option to detect if the automatically selected thumbnail is too black and thus no good, in which case it will automatically jump forward a bit until it finds a good one. This sort of continued development and improvement makes me really back it as a solution.)
    – Synetech
    Apr 2, 2014 at 18:07
  • virustotal.com shows that DrWeb detets Trojan.MulDrop19.62276 in Shark's_MediaInfo_v226.exe. What's up with that? Jul 25, 2022 at 14:45
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Well, this is a long way, but if you install K-Lite Codec pack, it asks for which file types thumnails need to be generated for explorer. It's a long way but it works.

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Try K-Lite Codec pack lite. It's not the full codec,but just the thumbnail creator for all video types and basic features.only 10 MB.

Download K-Lite Codec pack lite

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If you have an FLV player installed, such as VLC, the following registry hack might help.

Create a file named flv.reg file in Notepad and copy into it the following lines:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.flv\ShellEx\{BB2E617C-0920-11d1-9A0B-00C04FC2D6C1}]
@="{c5a40261-cd64-4ccf-84cb-c394da41d590}"

Save the file and double-click on it to execute the registry modification. You might need to logout and re-login for this to take effect.

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  • "The specified file is not a registry script."
    – endolith
    Apr 29, 2014 at 14:37
  • @endolith: I think you had an copy-paste error with the above text.
    – harrymc
    May 1, 2014 at 6:26
  • @endolith this probably means the extension is not correct - it is not a .reg files. You might have chosen the option to hide extension in explorer options. Disable that to be able to edit extensions.
    – Rolf
    Jul 31, 2018 at 9:19
  • Can anyone confirm that this is working? I have some doubts because I see a couple of GUIDs and I don't know if they are unique to the computer.
    – Rolf
    Jul 31, 2018 at 9:20
  • Not working, VLC Player installed, reg script executed, reboot -> no effect Aug 4, 2020 at 20:22

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