Control Panel Add/Rempve programs not showing "remove" buttons

For some reason, when I go to control panel, then add/remove programs, not all the programs have the remove button visible. There is no rhyme or reason as to which programs do and which don't have the button. I thought maybe there would be an uninstall in the program folder, but that is not the case.

Anyone have any ideas?? XP Home with service pack 2 and everything up to date as far as updates

 

Maybe this?

Some applications in Add/Remove Programs list are missing Change and Remove buttons ?

 

I followed the path they list and unfortunately very few programs are listed under that heading. None of the ones I need to fix.

Any other ideas?

 

None at the moment. However, there is another uninstall key located in the same path under HKEY_CURRENT_USER. Mine is empty though and I don't really know if it's ever used or not. It can't hurt to look and see if there's anything there though. I'll keep looking and see if I can come up with something else for you.

 

Error: Windows cannot find gpedit.msc, please make sure you typed it correctly... blah blah blah

Arrrgh! Now what?

Thanks for the help so far by the way!

 

I see you're using XP Home. Home doesn't have gpedit so that's why you get the error message. As for an answer to your problem, I haven't found one yet. At the moment, the only thing I can think of to try would be to search the registry for NoRemove and see if you can find them that way. They must be there somewhere or they wouldn't show up at all in add/remove.

I had a look at mine and all of the programs I have installed are listed under the uninstall key. They are all subkeys of the uninstall key. I'm not sure what's happening in your case.

 

Zander thanks for your help. I know it seems odd, all my software is listed under the software key, but not under the windows>current version>uninstall. I've searched for NoRemove and NoModify entries and I have found some under cryptic headings. Not sure if it is safe to change them all to 0 without knowing which programs they refer to.

 

I've got some of those "cryptic" sub keys in the uninstall key too. I hadn't looked at any of them before so I took a second look at mine. I turns out that some of the programs that show in my add/remove programs don't have key with their name either. Those that don't are found in those keys you mentioned. I did some experimenting here with a few of them. I added the NoRemove DWORD to a few of them and gave it a value of 1. Closed Regedit, opened add/remove and each of the programs I added the NoRemove to in the registry were missing the remove buttons. I then deleted a couple of the NoRemove values I added to the registry and changed the value of it to 0 (zero) in the others. In each case, the remove buttons for those programs were back when I opened add/remove programs again.

So, if you have any of those "cryptic" keys as subkeys to the unistall key, have a look in them. If you find one that has the NoRemove with a value of 1, try either deleting it or just change the value to 0. Then open add/remove programs and see if remove is available for that program. You can tell which program the key is for by clicking on it and looking in the right pane for a value named DisplayName. The data value for that will be the same name as you see in add/remove programs.

Now for the disclaimer . Other than my little bit of experimenting here, I haven't ever messed with those keys in the past. So, I can't tell you it's a sure thing that it's safe to do this. My guess is that it is, and, if it were me, and I found some of the NoRemove entries in those keys, I'd go ahead and change them. You'll have to be the judge yourself though.

 

Try the fix on Kelly's Korner, line 337, right-hand column, "Restore Change or Remove Programs. "

It won't hurt anything to run it, it usually fixes the problem.

 

Well that line 337 thing didn't work. Also, I have far more programs installed than I have cryptic folder names and a search for NoRemove/NoModify entries didn't reveal very many. I'm really trying here, I know it might begin to look like I am some sort of computer loser, but I know enough to follow advice and have built several PCs over the years. Never had this issued with Win98 !!

Any other ideas floating around?

 

I think your problem may be related to the non-population of Add/Remove items. Even if I’m wrong it won’t cause any harm to try the following, perhaps make a system restore point first just in case your’finger’ slips :

1. Go to Start > Run > type REGSVR32 APPWIZ.CPL (capitals for clarity only, also note the space) and press Enter. Then again Start > Run > type REGSVR32 MSHTML.DLL and press Enter.

2. If 1) above is not successful try this registry key deletion, go to Start > Run, type regedit, press Enter and navigate to registry key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\App Management
In the left pane, right-click ARPCache and delete it. Reboot the computer.

NOTE: The ARPCache key is where Add/Remove stores the details of programs that show in the list but it doesn't remove the details when you uninstall a program. If you look down the list (before deleting it, of course) you will see all your old programs. After deletion the key will be recreated by Windows.