How to Remove the “Unread Messages” Notification From the Login Screen

The Welcome screen is displayed by default on Windows XP Home Edition-based computers and on Windows XP Professional-based computers that are not members of a domain. Under your name on the Welcome screen, there is a hyperlink that indicates the number of unread e-mail messages. The hyperlink is displayed only if you have an e-mail client that is capable of updating the Welcome screen running on your computer. Currently, Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express and Microsoft Windows Messenger support this feature.

This e-mail hyperlink is only displayed if the e-mail client that your computer is running populates the following registry key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\UnreadMail

You cannot disable this feature in the user interface, nor can you configure the Welcome screen to populate the unread message count from only a particular e-mail program. For example, you might not want your e-mail messages from UserID@hotmail.com displayed on the Welcome screen. To work around this behavior, you can set the permissions on the following registry key to read-only for the System account:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\UnreadMail

When the program tries to update the registry key as new mail arrives, it will not have sufficient permission to do so and the Welcome screen will not be updated. To do this:

1. Start Registry Editor (Regedit).
2. Navigate to the following folder in the registry:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\UnreadMail

1. Right-click the UnreadMail folder, and then click Permissions.
2. Click the System account, and then click to select the Deny check box for Full Control.
3. Click OK.
4. Quit Registry Editor.