Having now observed this for myself, I agree that this is grossly inconvienient and annoying, especially for those who aren't used to doing things the "traditional" way. Very unprofessional - AlTools should definitely look into that.

Just want to say that I have been using AlZip 7 on my Windows 7 laptop ever since I got a free key from them (at least three months now); and I have not personally observed any of the problems mentioned within this topic.

I verified AlZip, version 8.0 (grabbed it from their website TODAY, 9/16/2010) DOES cause funny folder names.  It does this by adding a "New Folder" option to the top of the right-click context menu in Windows Explorer and others such as Blue Explorer (didn't see this in XPlorer2-lite, my current favorite file manager).

When you click "New Folder", you get one of several names.  I tried it 22 times and got a different folder name every time.  Some may find this fun and amusing, as in, "Gee, I wonder what my computer will do today?", but I find it very unprofessional.

Details of test:

Started Returnil

Started Windows Explorer and tested New Folder creation.  No issues.  Closed it.

Installed AlZip

Started Windows Explorer and tested New Folder creation.  No issues.  Closed it.

Registered AlZip with code from a few months ago, registered fine.

Started Windows Explorer and tested New Folder creation, this time using the "New Folder" option that wasn't there before.  After 22 tests, I had all these folders inside of M:\Downloads\New (the place where I was creating them):

New Age
Newport
Newbie
New Release
New Deal
New comer
New Years Day
Newark
New Mexico
New Moon
New Gate
Newbery
New Face
New Era
Nuclear
New Orleans
New Delhi
New Folder
Nutrogena
News Conference
New Kids on the Block
Newswire

Closed Windows Explorer

Uninstalled AlZip using Revo Uninstaller.

Started Windows Explorer and tested New Folder creation.  No issues.  Closed it.

Rebooted system and let Returnil clear out any remaining junk from the test.

So, not only does it create odd folder names instead of "New Folder" (ok, it DID call a new folder "New Folder" one time), it does this AFTER you have tested the trial version, think it's ok, and then register it.  Pretty rude.  I rest my case.

If anyone can verify AlZip does NOT do this on their system, then perhaps I'm running another program that the author of AlZip doesn't like?  I don't know what else to test, but I'm staying away from AlZip for now.

Just want to say that I have been using AlZip 7 on my Windows 7 laptop ever since I got a free key from them (at least three months now); and I have not personally observed any of the problems mentioned within this topic.

Try this:

Type about:config in your FF address box.

In the filter field type "download".

Look for "browser.download.dir". This should be where the browser downloads files to by default. You should be able to change this to what you want.

I followed your original suggestion (waaaaayyyy up there at the top) and restarted Firefox in Safe Mode to disable ALL extensions. The folder problem went away.  Every way I tried to download a picture or program or movie, all tried to save to the correct place.

I disabled groups of extensions and tested, disabled others, tested again....  After a while I narrowed it down to the culprit:

SOTHINK FLASH DOWNLOADER, version 1.4.2.

This was installed the day before I noticed the problem and posted my first question.  How did I miss that small clue before?   When I disabled it and re-enabled all the others, downloading worked as expected.  I uninstalled it. Don't think I ever found a time where it could help me grab something that DownloadHelper could not get.

Anyway, today was the first day I had a chance to experiment.  I love all the help I can get here on DotTech, and hope my discovery can help someone else! I'll try to tell Sothink about this if there's a way to contact them on their site.

Type about:config in your FF address box.
In the filter field type "download".

Look for "browser.download.dir". This should be where the browser downloads files to by default. You should be able to change this to what you want.

As for the issue with Firefox ALWAYS wanting to download to C:\, I haven't fixed it yet or narrowed down a cause.  It doesn't happen when I use right-click + V ("saVe as") to save a selected picture, but always happens when I use "Save Link" or other ways to download things.  Once I select the folder I normally use for downloads, it remembers it for the rest of the session but next time I start Firefox it's back to C:\.  If I figure it out I'll try to post the cause here.

if you curious about virus/trojan maybe u can download and install Microsoft Security Essential. It's a free Antivirus from Microsoft :) and so far im quiet happy with it :)

I tried MSE today, I'm surprised at how quickly it did a full scan (about 2 hours, compared to 5 or 6 for Avira Antivir personal).  It found and removed several potentially bad programs that Avira and Malwarebytes did not find.  Most were in downloaded programs I haven't installed yet.  One was Free Commander, which I've used for years, but since it doesn't work so well with large folders I decided to let MSE remove that as well.  So I'm happy with the results of the scan, but MSE seems to be seriously slowing down my computer, specifically inside a file manager called Blue Explorer.  Listing files in a folder, containing about 700 files & folders, took about 15 seconds instead of the 3-4 seconds it normally takes.  At least the "real time protection" can be turned off when needed!  So thanks again for the suggestion.

if you curious about virus/trojan maybe u can download and install Microsoft Security Essential. It's a free Antivirus from Microsoft :) and so far im quiet happy with it :)

I haven't tried MSE yet, I always thought it was nuts to think the company that allowed all the security holes in Windows in the first place would know how to write a security program.  But I'm getting quite tired of all the false positives from Avira (it's found at least 4 or 5 files today that are part of Online Armor, and more from a music sequencer that's been installed for almost 3 years now).  So I'll give MSE a try this weekend.  Thanks!  I'll also run SuperAntiSpyware and Spybot just for good measure.

I'm still hoping someone here will recognize "New Haven" and know all about how it got into my PC.  There are so many helpful and knowledgable people that visit this site!

You can probably fix the "New Haven.txt" issue if you are willing to edit your registry.

(rest of post omitted, it's just two posts above this one)

Karen, I dug around and found "New Haven" in only one registry key, HKEY_USERS\####\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\NamingTemplates

I changed it to "New Text Document" and now all is well, except I'd sure like to know what changed it in the first place!  Thanks for the advice.

Also, as for the Firefox issue, I hoped upgrading to 3.6.7 would help, but it didn't.  I'll try disabling extensions and plugins, going to take a long time to find the right one but if I disable ALL of them and the problem goes away, then I know it's one of them!

1) open up regedit.exe
2) search for New Haven and check the box to check for all words only
3) you will probably find a match and then you can change that text to something else like the usual default "New Text Document"

For instance, I just searched for "New Text Document" and I found it as the value for a registry key of "@F:\Windows\system32\notepad.exe,-470".

As for FF, I would try disabling all your extensions and see if the behavior goes away and if it does, enabling them one by one until you find the culprit.

1. When I use the right-click context menu, select New, then Text Document, it creates a new empty .txt file but it always names it "New Haven.txt".  This happens in Windows Explorer and other file managers I've tried.  

2. When I download a file in Firefox 3.6.6 using right-click and Save As... or Save Link As..., a dialog box asks me for the location but it always starts at root of drive C:, and not the downloads folder specified in Options.  Once I pick a location, it remembers that until I exit Firefox.  The dialog box looks different - has a firefox logo and says "save image", but appears to be a standard Windows file chooser.  I've never had to respecify my downloads folder before...

Neither of these is a serious issue but it's NOT how it worked a week or two ago and I'm worried something may be taking over my PC.  A full scan with both Avira Antivir presonal and Malwarebytes Antimalware showed no issues.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!