A very useful tool that comes built-in to Windows XP is the inherent zip support. This allows you to view, create, and extract zip files without having a third party tool. There are times that you will want to use a third-party zip compression program, and at those times, the built-in zip support may conflict. If this is the case, you can follow these steps to disable or re-enable the built-in zip support for Windows XP.

Disable Built-In Zip Support

1. Click on the Start Menu.
2. Click on the Run option from the start menu.
3. When the Run dialog box comes up, enter the following in the Open field : regsvr32 /u %windir%\system32\zipfldr.dll
4. After typing that in, left click once on OK. This will remove the built-in zip support for your computer.
5. Restart your computer.

Enable Built-In Zip Support

1. Click on the Start Menu.
2. Click on the Run option from the start menu.
3. When the Run dialog box comes up, enter the following in the Open field : regsvr32 %windir%\system32\zipfldr.dll
4. After typing that in, left click once on OK. This will re-enable the built-in zip support for your computer.
5. Restart your computer.

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Lawrence Abrams
Bleeping Computer Windows XP Tutorial Series
BleepingComputer.com: Computer Support & Tutorials for the beginning computer user.