Opera will not make itself the default browser without asking you? I beg to differ!

I made the mistake of installing Opera 17 on my Windows 7 64 bit machine today. It has not only set itself as the default browser (without asking!), but I cannot now set any other browser as the default. Even when I go into Internet Options and set Internet Explorer as the default, it immediately goes back to Opera.

I was previously using Opera 12.15, and when I installed version 17, it installed in addition to the older version. When I uninstalled both versions, I discovered that my machine will now not open any browser by default, even after a reboot.

Is there any way, other than going back to a pre-Opera 17 restore point, that I can choose my own default browser?

Well this could be an issue with my machine, but IE isn't on my list under "set your default programs".

It is there under "set program access and computer defaults", but selecting it was having no effect. In the end, the only way to reinstate IE as the default browser was to go back to a restore point before Opera 17 was installed. After that, I was able to re-install Opera 17 and de-select the option to set Opera as the default browser.

In the course of all this, I discovered that Opera 12.16 has the same install process, i.e. after you start the install you have to select "options" and untick the option to select Opera as the default browser. The difference is that if you forget to do this on installing Opera 12.16, you can change the default browser later, whereas on installing Opera 17, if you don't untick the box then you are stuck with Opera as the default browser for ever.

Oops, maybe I shouldn't use the phrase "stuck with Opera as the default browser" on an Opera forum

OK so when you start the install of Opera 17 you have to click "Options" and then you have to deselect the option to make Opera your default browser. A bit naughty if you ask me...

For some reason, I can't set my default browser back to Internet Explorer, but now I can at least set it to Firefox :p

Opera will not make itself the default browser without asking you? I beg to differ!

I made the mistake of installing Opera 17 on my Windows 7 64 bit machine today. It has not only set itself as the default browser (without asking!), but I cannot now set any other browser as the default. Even when I go into Internet Options and set Internet Explorer as the default, it immediately goes back to Opera.

I was previously using Opera 12.15, and when I installed version 17, it installed in addition to the older version. When I uninstalled both versions, I discovered that my machine will now not open any browser by default, even after a reboot.

Is there any way, other than going back to a pre-Opera 17 restore point, that I can choose my own default browser?