How to disable thumbnail previews? SOLVED

[TheDecathlon]

Hello,

I've recently reinstalled PDF-XChange Editor (Windows 10), this time with Shell Extensions enabled. I wanted to allow Directory Opus to quickly show PDF previews, and it worked fine.

Problem is that I do not want the Explorer thumbnail previews on PDF icons, mostly visible on the Desktop icons and elsewhere. What's the correct way to disable them? Can't find it. Is it even possible?

Played a bit with PDF-XChange Editor's File Associations settings and also with XCShInfoSetup.exe, but couldn't change anything. Thumbnail previews are still there.

I only want to disable PDF thumbnails, not all icon previews (the latter is easy to do in File Explorer's options).

Thank you

[Daniel - PDF-XChange]

Hello, TheDecathlon

The first thing to do is follow the steps here to open our shell utility, and then ensure that you have set the thumbnail handlers to "none"
https://www.pdf-xchange.com/knowle ... extensions
Following that, use the steps in this article to clear the thumbnail cache windows already has in place:
https://www.pdf-xchange.com/knowle ... ails-cache
Then, restart your PC. This should result in all PDF documents simply using a single small "pdf" icon, instead of a thumbnail preview.

Kind regards,

[TheDecathlon]

Thank you, it worked. However, it seems that after every PDF-XChange Editor update that Thumbnail Handlers setting is being reset back to PDF X-Change. So, the thumbnails are back and this process needs to be repeated each time.

Perhaps you could make it remember its previous setting, even if Shell Extensions are enabled during installation/update?

[Daniel - PDF-XChange]

Hello, TheDecathlon

Paul is just checking with the Dev team to see if this is something which we can make "respected" by the update process, at the moment we are unsure.

In the meantime I wanted to mention that windows does have per folder handling for this display method, so if, say, you wanted to show thumbnails in most places, but just not on the desktop and a few select others, you could disable them only for those folders, and that would remain in place permanently for those folders, regardless of the shell extensions installed or in use. This is done from the "view" tab in explorer, while looking at the folder in question.

explorer_Pykvw0muYK.gif

Kind regards,

[TheDecathlon]

Thanks for the helpful extra tip. Still hope you can add this improvement.

[Radi - PDF-XChange]

[hydeta]

HI,
Is this function already apply? I want to show only PDF icon in desktop (not with thumbnail previews), it's really messy when thumbnail previews on PDF icons combine other picture in desktop. Even thumbnail previews with a little icon is much better!

Thanks!

[Stefan - PDF-XChange]

Hello hydeta,

There is already a solution a bit further up in this topic. Set the preview handler to "none" and then clear any thumbnails caches there might already be. We do not for now have any plans to makey any other tools or changes that would allow a different way to turn those thumbnail previews on or off.

Kind regards,
Stefan

[pandzior]

Hi x-change team!

I trying to disable the display of thumbnails according to your method, but after clearing the thumbnail cache after a few seconds they start refreshing.

It doesn't make a difference if I set the option in red in the preferences to "NO"

{D3A45B3B-EA30-4A5C-8E42-1F0FADE1FC01}.png

Also in shell extensions I have the first two options on <none>

{CA32E9A3-1591-4599-A31B-8D3CA3D9DDC1}.png

I thought maybe the adobe reader I have installed on my work computer was causing the problem, but I checked on my private computer where I have only x-change installed and the problem is also occurring.

I am using windows version 22H2.

For now I have deactivated thumbnails in windows folder options but it is a annoying because it disables all thumbnails.

[Daniel - PDF-XChange]

Hello, pandzior

Regarding that menu in the Editor, it is expected that it reverts back to "do not change", that is simply the situation because windows will not directly tell the editor the status of the changes that we have requested to be made. It is a simple "send and forget" process, like writing a letter. You do not know the recipient received they get back to you; usually that would mean the thumbnails appearing or disappearing in this case.

I presume that you followed the steps above to clear your windows thumbnails cache? If you have not, even with our thumbnails disabled, previously caches thumbnail icons will be displayed by windows directly.

The first thing to do is follow the steps here to open our shell utility, and then ensure that you have set the thumbnail handlers to "none"
https://www.pdf-xchange.com/knowledgeba ... extensions
Following that, use the steps in this article to clear the thumbnail cache windows already has in place:
https://www.pdf-xchange.com/knowledgeba ... ails-cache
Then, restart your PC. This should result in all PDF documents simply using a single small "pdf" icon, instead of a thumbnail preview.

Assuming you have, and the thumbnails cache was cleaned, Could I ask for a screenshot of what you see when thumbnails are enabled? Given that our shell extension there states "none" are in use, the previews may not be coming from us at all, but seeing their appearance should help me to identify that.

Kind regards,