Windows Media Player adds Onedrive folder even after I've removed it

2

Screen shotWindows 10 1709 and Windows Media Player 12. WMP is adding a Onedrive folder containing all my music. When I go through Organise -> Manage Libraries -> Music and remove the folder, it re-appears after the next reboot. The folder in Onedrive is not shared, and I have never added it to WMP. It's doing the same thing with Pictures, although that's not such an issue as I don't have too many of them. Any clues how to remove the Onedrive folder permanently?

Chris Wilson

Posted 2017-12-25T01:13:01.247

Reputation: 21

Can you add a screenshot? I don’t understand what it is you are seeing that is out of the ordinary. OneDrive is built in to Windows 10. – Appleoddity – 2017-12-25T03:49:28.247

I've just recently uploaded all my music files to Onedrive for backup. The first time I used WMP after that, I noticed all the files and playlists from Onedrive were being downloaded into WMP. I went into the music library area, and removed the Onedrive folder which had mysteriously appeared along with the local folders I had in WMP.On the next reboot, the folder appeared again. – Chris Wilson – 2017-12-25T04:08:40.130

Well that’s why the folder keeps coming back you have logged into OneDrive. Why do you want to get rid of the folder? – Ramhound – 2017-12-25T04:11:16.990

I don't want the files from Onedrive in my music library. The same songs are already there from the local HDD – Chris Wilson – 2017-12-25T04:13:27.167

I would suggest trying to remove the folder using Explorer instead of WMP, by right-clicking the Music library in Explorer and select Properties, from where you can also remove the folder. Does that help? – Tim De Baets – 2018-01-07T21:30:53.957

Thanks Tim, but I don't want to remove access to the files (songs) in Onedrive, so I cannot delete the Songs folder in Explorer. The issue is WMP keeps adding the Songs folder from Onedrive. I can delete it, but next time I boot & open WMP, it's back. Then it takes an hour to index the 30000 songs! – Chris Wilson – 2018-01-08T04:35:35.953

What I meant was: removing the folder as a library location, just like in WMP but then from within Explorer. I definitely didn't suggest removing the folder itself. – Tim De Baets – 2018-01-08T21:36:12.197

OK Tim, I see what you mean, and yes, the Onedrive folder shows under Music in Libraries. I've never been into this section before, but I can see the folders within Music are the WMP folders I've added.If I delete the Onedrive folders from Libraries, can I put them back should I choose in the future? If so, how? Thanks – Chris Wilson – 2018-01-10T06:07:43.177

Update:- When I delete the Onedrive folder from within WMP, the folder also disappears from Libraries. Are you suggesting that if I delete the folder fom libraies, it will delete it from WMP, and hopefully not return by itself? Is the Libraries section of Explorer just a "copy" of Library locations added in WMP? – Chris Wilson – 2018-01-10T06:16:55.643

Yes, that's exactly what I was suggesting :) The library locations in WMP are indeed equivalent to those in Explorer. In Explorer, you could re-add the folder to the Library by using the Include a folder button in Properties. – Tim De Baets – 2018-01-10T21:32:19.043

Removing Onedrive from Libraries does not work. After a reboot, it reappears. The only way I've found is to uncheck the folder in Onedrive settings. – Chris Wilson – 2018-01-14T20:34:20.370

Answers

0

Unfortunately, OneDrive automatically adds these folders to the Libraries whenever it starts up, and there doesn't seem to be any way to disable this behavior. There are however workarounds to address this, such as running a small program at startup that removes the OneDrive folders from Libraries again. See Emil Junker's post in this thread.

Another workaround suggested here is to modify the permissions of the internal .library-ms file so that OneDrive is blocked from modifying the library's location. But that's more advanced so I would recommend trying the first workaround first.

Tim De Baets

Posted 2017-12-25T01:13:01.247

Reputation: 882

0

You don't have to use 'Organise > Manage Libraries' to remove default search path for WMP in Windows 10 (or at least is not enough…). To remove OneDrive search path completely for WMP you have to do:

  • open WMP
  • right aside the Back-Forward blue buttons in the upper part, click on the small arrow ►, this will open another pop-up menu
  • now navigate to Multimedia catalogue > Music (note icon) > Folder (folder icon)
  • from this pane remove the default OneDrive folder and leave only your local user Music folder

and WMP shouldn't try to re-sync it every time after reboot.

hexaae

Posted 2017-12-25T01:13:01.247

Reputation: 83

Asked: 2017-12-25T01:13:01.247

Viewed: 795 times

Active: 2019-04-25T00:10:11.467