How to Set VLC as the Default DVD Player (Windows 7)

Having spent some time searching the web for an answer to this question, I found the same partial information repeated many times. I prefer to keep auto-play disabled. However, I was still finding that Windows Media Player would always start when I double-clicked the DVD drive icon.

Eventually, I decided to have a bit of a dig around in the system.

Here’s my suggestion:

• Open regedit: enter “regedit” into the search box on the Start button’s pop-up dialog
• Navigate to the key <HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\DVD\shell\play\command>
• Note that <(Default)> is set to “%ProgramFiles(x86)%\Windows Media Player\wmplayer.exe” /prefetch:4 /device:DVD “%L”
• Take a look instead at <HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\DVD\shell\PlayWithVLC\command>
• Note that <(Default)> is set to “C:\Program Files (x86)\VideoLAN\VLC\vlc.exe” –started-from-file dvd://%1
• Copy the latter value into the former entry

This can alternatively be achieved via a registry import. Copy the following into a file called, say, <VLC_for_DVD.reg>:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\DVD\shell\play\command]
@="\"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\VideoLAN\\VLC\\vlc.exe\" --started-from-file dvd://%1"

(That’s for a 64-bit Windows 7 system; you may need to adjust that for 32-bit systems, or other editions of Windows.)

Double click on the file’s icon to import the values into the registry.

For reference, my search revealed the following suggested partial solutions

• Open VLC
• From the Tools menu select Preferences
• Select the Interface page (if not already selected)
• Scroll down to find the Set up associations… button, and click it
• Select all or any required extensions
• Save

and

• From the Start button, select Control Panel
• [if list view] Select AutoPlay
• [if category view] Select Hardware and Sound, and then AutoPlay
• Select VLC in the combobox for DVD movie
• set AutoPlay for all media devices as preferred

HTH