You have a 64 bit Windows version and Firefox is a 32 bit application and thus uses programs located in the C:\Windows\SysWOW64\ folder. The System32 folder is for 64 bit programs on 64 bit Windows.

Thanks. I had a dreadful feeling that this was the case.

Ok guys im back. i cannot seem to get windows AND firefox to agree on using the same notepad.exe

no matter what i try, firefox refuses to use anything but the .exe in syswow64. and windows refuses to use anything outside of system32 folder....is there any way i can win??

what i am trying to achieve is a working jump list in the start menu and when i click a text file on the PC AND text files downloaded from firefox to all open in the same stack on the task bar.

it almost feels like i have to downgrade windows to 32 bit in order to achieve this simple task because my wife insists on using firefox. =(

why does firefox even care whether notepad is 32 or 64 if your just sending a file open command to notepad?

i could understand if you wanted to open the .txt to view within firefox, but surely its not that hard to send a simple request to windows to use ITS default program for that file type regardless of 32/64?

I' not on a 64 bit OS, but I think that it is quite possible that Firefox is not involved in this and that this is done automatically by the OS because Firefox runs in a 32 bit environment and thus only 32 bit applications can be used and started and Windows can redirect automatically or otherwise abort if there is no 32 bit version.