Vista - Thumbnails in Windows Explorer

For all my photos, unless I view them in "Windows Photo Gallery which is inconvenient -- I want to view them in Windows Explorer, I do not see real true thumbnails, I just see this default scene of water, green hills and sky. I have followed the instructions here Thumbnails in Windows Explorer here Default Programs - Program Default Associations (tho I wasn't thrilled about making Windows Photo Gallery my default program for JPG, I followed these instructions anyhow). I NEVER had a problem like this in XP. I'm beginning to understand why Vista has such a bad reputation. Using (or attempting to use) Vista Home Premium 64-bit, BTW, (much less important question) why doesn't my Photoshop Elements even show up as an option when I set default programs? Any help is appreciated. This problem was annoying before but to still have it after going thru all these forum instructions is really annoying.

Hello Angelag, and welcome to Vista Forums.

You can use Open With on the file type and browse to the Photoshop Elements exe file to have it open the file type with that program by default instead.

Have you checked the View settings in Windows Explorer to see if it is set to either Medium Icons, Large Icons, or Extra Large Icons to see a thumbnail preview of the file image as the icon?

Thank you, Brink, for the quick reply.
Yes, I have checked the View settings in Windows Explorer to Medium Icons, Large Icons, or Extra Large Icons to see a thumbnail preview of the file image as the icon?
The problem is the preview thumbnail is that default scenic photo. Not my photos. I only see those in Windows Photo Gallery or in slideshow or when I open the things.

Well, since you already did all of the above, you might see if running a sfc /scannow can find and fix any system files that may be responsible.

You might also rebuild the icon cache to see if that can help.

Hi angelag and welcome to Vista Forums

Have a look at this post to see if it helps: File folders and file name :/
Note that you will need the Unchecked option.

Hi Dwarf, thanks, that worked.

Brink, I ran "verify only" in scan verify. It did report errors but when I looked at the log file, well, I didn't know what to look for. Are there any particular words I should look for in the log file to see where my particular file problems might be? Thanks.

LOL Angelag, I thought that you already did that. Thumbnails in Windows Explorer

I'm happy to hear that you got it sorted though.

I would go ahead and run the full sfc /scannow scan to see if it can fix them. The log is a bit difficult to read. The main thing is to look for the [SR] tags with file names listed as unable to fix or corrupted. Usually though it is almost impossible to fix these files easily if the full scan cannot do it for you.