.sesx file association lost?

Question

This is a pesky one.  I recently upgraded from Audition CS5.5 to Audition 6 and uninstalled CS5.5.  Since I did that, however, the .sesx file association in my computer has been lost.  When I try to reassign .sesx to Audition, the computer defaults to Adobe Acrobat to attempt to open an .sesx file, even when I specifically navigate to the Audition folder and indicate Audition as the default program to open .sesx.
I realize the first and most obvious step is to simply reinstall Audition CS6, but there were difficulties activating the software.  I was upgrading just Audition out of the entire Creative Suite CS5.5 package, as it was the only software I NEEDED to upgrade (for some reason Audition CS5.5 caused me nothing but problems, but CS6 is infinitely more stable on my system, and none of the other CS6 software had features that justified a $500 upgrade).  So I had to contact support and they had to give me a support code and all of these hoops had to be jumped through to install the new software.  I'd much rather avoid having to do all of that again.
Is there a way to reassign the file association other than reinstalling?  And while I'm at it, if I DO reinstall, will THAT even solve the problem?

Answer 1

Hey,
it appears the application registration within the windows registry was corrupted, probably due to uninstalling a previous version of Audition.
Fixing this should be easy:
In Windows Registry (win key, type 'regedit', hit enter) navigate (left side of the window) to
Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications and find your
Adobe Audition CS6.exe named folder.
Navigate under its name to the subfolder shell>open>command.
Within command double click the default key (right side of the window) and check if the path to the audition executable is correct, fix it here if needed.
Having installed into default location, the path should be "C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Adobe Audition CS6\Adobe Audition CS6.exe" "%1"
Hit okay (you're fine closing regedit now)
Finally try and reassociate the file type as you normally would.
Now, as the path to the exe is actually correct, it should show up in the list of programs (after having browsed for it) and everything should work fine, including icons etc.
Make sure Audition is selected within the list (after browsing) before finally hitting okay.
That btw, is how Acrobat or any other program got into play here, Acrobat simply happened to be at the top of that list (from associations before) and got selected because Audition wasn't actually added to the list (because of the broken path).
If this does not work for you, maybe using a third party tool to have access to 'basic' windows functions like editing file associations, like really editing them, like.. you were able to back in XP.. unlike vista or 7.. oh well. err, you might want to try e.g. this one: http://defaultprogramseditor.com/
Note to the Adobe devs:
For me, the path should have been "C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Adobe Audition CS6\Adobe Audition CS6.exe" but was "C:\Program Files (x86)\AdobeAdobe Audition CS6\Adobe Audition CS6.exe".
Note the missing backslash ("\") after the Adobe folder within the 32bit programs folder. Smells like you're typical minor issue with the install/un-install business
On the bigger picture, uninstalling older versions, should not cause file associations to get broken to begin with. I had this with all the CS apps, but in a different way, for apps other than Audition, like photoshop, premiere, etc.. it just deregistered the file extension but didn't break the exe path for them, so reassociating was easy, still.. a bug
Note to Microsoft:
If your OS can't find a registered executable, why not prompt the user for the path or at least let them know?! ^^
Hope this helps,
Cheers