Introduction

The My Recent Documents folder on the Windows XP Start menu displays a list of files and documents that you most recently used.

Removing the Recent Documents link from XP Start Menu

To remove the My Recent Documents folder from XP Start Menu, try this:

> Right-click Start, and then click Properties
> Click Customize
> Click the Advanced tab
> Under Recent documents, uncheck List my most recently opened documents
> Click OK, and then OK.

Equivalent registry value

Open Registry Editor and navigate to:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER \ Software \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ Explorer \ Advanced

Backup the key to a file.
Set the value of Start_ShowRecentDocs accordingly.
Value of 0 - List my most recently opened documents is disabled
Value of 2 - List my most recently opened documents is enabled

Different setting for the Windows Classic Start Menu

For the Classic Start Menu, set NoRecentDocsMenu to 1 in this key:

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

NoRecentDocsMenu value may not exist by default. If so, create a new value of type REG_DWORD and set it's data to 1