How to Customize Default Places Bar in Windows Common File Dialog Box?

When you open, save or browse for a file, Windows opens a "common file dialog box" containing a few shortcuts in left side pane which is called "Places Bar" and the shortcuts are called "Places".
As you can see in the above screenshot, My Recent Documents, Desktop, etc are the default places. Many times we want to customize those shortcuts so that we can add our desired shortcuts there.
In this tutorial, I'll tell you how to customize these default places. So here we start the tutorial without wasting our time:
1. Open regedit and goto:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\

2. Now right-click on "Policies" key and select "New -> Key". It'll create a new key, give it name "comdlg32". Now again right-click on this new "comdlg32" key and select "New -> Key" and give the new key name "Placesbar". So the final key path would be:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\comdlg32\Placesbar

3. Now select "Placesbar" key and in right-side pane, create a new String value "Place0" and set its value to your desired path. You can set it to a drive like C:\ (make sure you put a slash "\" at last) or you can set it to a particular folder like D:\Wallpapers. You can also use some predefined values to put system elements in Places Bar:

MyComputer
MyDocuments
MyMusic
MyPictures
MyNetworkPlaces
MyFavorites
CommonDocuments
CommonMusic
CommonPictures
Desktop
Printers
Recent
ProgramFiles

You can set upto 5 places. So to change other default places, create new String values Place1, Place2, Place3 and Place4 and set their value to your desired path.

4. That's it. Now you'll see your desired places in common file dialog box:

PS: You can also use "TweakUI" to change the default places. Download it from here and run it. Now navigate to "Common Dialogs -> Places Bar" and in right-side pane, you can change them:

NOTE: This tutorial will work in all Windows versions. Windows Vista uses a new file dialog box which is easy to customize by right-click in the Favorite Links pane and select "Open Favorite Links Folder". It'll open the folder where you can add / remove any shortcut. A few applications still use old common file dialog box in Vista, so this tutorial will work for them.
BONUS TIP: This tutorial will not change places bar in open/save dialog boxes in Microsoft Office. To change them visit following tutorial:
How to Customize the Places Bar in Common File Dialog Box in Microsoft Office?

Posted in: win xp