Decrapify NCH VideoPad

NCH VideoPad is an excellent “free” video editor.

I would recommend VideoPad heartily if NCH didn’t crap on their own work.

But unfortunately “free” needs those scare quotes, because its installer just behaves badly.  Here’s how, and my answer to each:

1. The installer tries to sneak on several irrelevant crapware apps.
   → This is unfortunately common.  Always click “custom” and uncheck the extras.
2. Without notice or permission, it pollutes your start menu with web links to other products.
   → Less common, but easy to just delete.
3. It gets worse: The add context menu links which prompt you to download and install their Express Zip tool.
   → Download ShellMenuView to remove the menu entries.
4. The topper: It associates a raft of file extensions to their “Install On Demand Component”.  So when you click on a .DOC or PDF file, you don’t get Word/Wordpad or Adobe Reader, you get railroaded into downloading and installing their Doxillion app.
   → Nobody else had an answer, so I tracked down the registry entries to remove.  Here’s what it looks like as a .reg file:

   Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
   
   [-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\docfile\Shell\NCHconvertdoc]
   [-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\docxfile\Shell\NCHconvertdoc]
   [-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\htmlfile\Shell\NCHconvertdoc]
   [-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\NitroPDFReader.Document.3\Shell\NCHconvertdoc]
   [-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\odtfile\Shell\NCHconvertdoc]
   [-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\rtffile\Shell\NCHconvertdoc]
   [-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\wpdfile\Shell\NCHconvertdoc]
   [-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\wpfile\Shell\NCHconvertdoc]

   (Save as a reg file and run it, or manually delete those paths yourself.)

It’s a shame — VideoPad has a paid premium version with more features, and I would recommend it heartily if NCH didn’t crap on their own work.

Possible alternative: it looks like <a href=”http://portableapps.com/node/19682″>you can make VideoPad Portable.</a>  That certainly keeps it clean.