T oget rid of the search assistant in Windows XP copy the following into notepad

Option Explicit

Dim WSHShell, n, MyBox, p, itemtype, Title, vbdefaultbutton

Set WSHShell = WScript.CreateObject(“WScript.Shell”)
p = “HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\CabinetState\”
p = p & “Use Search Asst”
itemtype = “REG_SZ”
n = “no”

WSHShell.RegWrite p, n, itemtype
Title = “The Search Assistant is now disabled.” & vbCR
Title = Title & “You may need to Log off/Log on” & vbCR
Title = Title & “For the change to take effect.”
MyBox = MsgBox(Title,64,”Finished”)

And then save as a .vbs file

Run and then after a reboot you can go to search and will have the old classic search instead of the wizard type search.

I have run this on several computers but have left the search assistant on the laptop at home because my 2 year old likes to see the dog in the search assistant.