Windows Server 2008: how to remove “favorite links” from Explorer

How can I make them go away for just this window I'm opening?

I don't really think you can. All the extra stuff in the left-pane is a standard part of the Win7 explorer. Any portions of it that you can turn off are turned off globally for all explorer instances in that user's profile. I don't think there has ever been a supported way to turn off explorer features on a per-instance basis.

You might be able to get down and dirty with window handles and Win32 APIs to tweak or hide the widgets that you don't want seen once you've opened your instance. But I can't really give you any pointers where to begin with that.

Well, I think I found the right registry edit. Before (note that Contacts folder has had 'hidden' attribute set, so it doesn't show in the main pane but is still visible in the Navigation Pane): Here is an after shot: Here's the PowerShell code to perform the edit, it must be run from an Admin PowerShell console:

$FDkey = 'HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FolderDescriptions'
@(
'{31C0DD25-9439-4F12-BF41-7FF4EDA38722}' # 3D Objects
'{56784854-C6CB-462B-8169-88E350ACB882}' # Contacts
'{1777F761-68AD-4D8A-87BD-30B759FA33DD}' # Favorites
'{bfb9d5e0-c6a9-404c-b2b2-ae6db6af4968}' # Links
'{4BD8D571-6D19-48D3-BE97-422220080E43}' # My Music
'{a0c69a99-21c8-4671-8703-7934162fcf1d}' # Local Music
'{33E28130-4E1E-4676-835A-98395C3BC3BB}' # My Pictures
'{0ddd015d-b06c-45d5-8c4c-f59713854639}' # Local Pictures
'{4C5C32FF-BB9D-43b0-B5B4-2D72E54EAAA4}' # SavedGames
'{7d1d3a04-debb-4115-95cf-2f29da2920da}' # Searches
'{35286a68-3c57-41a1-bbb1-0eae73d76c95}' # Local Videos
'{18989B1D-99B5-455B-841C-AB7C74E4DDFC}' # My Video
) | Foreach {
   $keypath = "$FDkey\$_\PropertyBag"
   new-item -path $keypath -erroraction silentlycontinue
   New-ItemProperty -path $keypath -name ThisPCPolicy -value Hide -force
}
get-process explorer | stop-process

Keith