How to Disable “HomeGroup” Feature in Windows 7?

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Recently an AskVG reader asked how can he remove "Homegroup" icon from My Computer window in Windows 7?

"Homegroup" is a new feature in Windows 7 which allows to share files and printers on a home network quickly and easily. You can get more info about Homegroup at this link.

The Homegroup can be accessed using Windows Explorer. Its displayed in Navigation pane as shown below:

Now the important thing is that not all people are going to use this new feature. If you have a single PC and don't want to use this feature, why not disable it and save some system resources? Yes, Homegroup runs 2 services in background and you can stop those services to free some valuable system resources.

So today in this tutorial, we are going to tell you how to disable "Homegroup" feature in Windows 7? So without wasting any time, lets start the tutorial:

1. Open Computer and right-click on "Homegroup" icon present in Navigation pane and select "Change HomeGroup Settings":

2. Now click on "Leave the homegroup..." link given at bottom.

3. It'll ask for confirmation, click on "Leave the homegroup" button.

4. After that, close Explorer window. Now type services.msc in RUN or Startmenu Searchbox and press Enter. It'll open "Services" window.

Here look for following 2 services:

HomeGroup Listener
HomeGroup Provider

Once you find them, double-click on each and change the "Startup type" to Disabled. Apply the changes and exit from Services window.

5. That's it. It'll permanently disable "HomeGroup" feature and its icon will also be removed from Windows Explorer:

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This article was posted by VG in following section: Troubleshooting, Windows 7.

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karthik

hi
i am having a problem with rename my disk drives.all the drives are named as local disk and i cannot rename them.please help me with this
Daniel

Wonderful. Have looked for this since beta.

No just a same tutorial to remove libraries is needed because I don't need them and they waste space in the left pane of the explorer.
VG

^^ Most probably a bug in RC.

@MAGNUMHEART
It seems your Shell32.dll file size is very large. Try to remove unnecessary BITMAPs, AVIs from the file.

@Daniel
I'm going to post the tutorial very soon. So stay tuned.

@karthik
Did you try to set the label using drive properties?
MAGNUMHEART

vg do u mean "shell32.dll" is the only problem

and modifying other dlls and cpls doesnt have to do with it? ^^

thx. can i just revert the normal dll for "shell32.dll" can u provide a link.
karthik

yup i have even tried disk management.but in vain
terminator406

Hi VG , can you please tell me how to remove network icon from explorer
David

I have win7 and before I follow the steps to remove homegroup I would like to know is it possible to reinstate homegroup if required or would it be a reinstallation of windows 7?
VG

^^ You can re-enable the disabled services and Homegroup feature will come back.
David

Can I assume that is done by just reinstating the 2 services that had been disabled? or is there something else that needs to be done, I ask so I am totally clear as to the steps I will need to take should the need arise.

Thanks by the way!
VG

^^ Yes. You just need to re-enable the services and then you can create a new HomeGroup.