Opening multiple dwgs in single instance of acad without splasg screen (/nologo)

[Anonymous]

We would like to be able to open multiple dwgs in a single instance of acad.exe from windows explorer.

As far as we know, this is right now only possible if we specify acLauncher.exe as a default program to open dwg files.

The issue we have with this, is that we would like to avoid loading of a splash screen.

Is it possible to either:

1. Remove splash screen if we use acLauncher.exe or
2. Default to....\acad.exe to open dwg files, and it will open them in the same instances of acad under different tabs.

We set our acad to have sdi as a value 0, and NEWTABMODE to be 1, but that doesn't help. Switch /nologo is not effective on aclauncher.

Our OS is Win7, 64 bit, and acad is 2015.

Thank You.

[ВeekeeCZ]

There is TASKBAR variable as well.

[Anonymous]

Taskbar is set to 1. Have no effect on functionality we desire.

[Anonymous]

Is there anybody that have tried to modify this behaviour?

[ВeekeeCZ]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Is there anybody that have tried to modify this behaviour?

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Usually SDI 0 works. If not, then TASKBAR - which is just visual thing. As you can see HERE "in some circumstances" it does not works... then they are suggesting Reset to default settings.

You're second issue... I guess the only way how to achieve that is add /nologo paramert in REGISTRY 

HKEY...USER/Software/Autodesk/DWGCommon/shellex/apps/...:Autocad/OpenLaunch

And to answer your question, yes - SDI 0 works for me (c3d 2016). The second I just have tried and it works. But I'm using windows shortcut's parametrs because of C3D/ACAD profiles.

[Anonymous · Accepted solution]

We figured it out, I hope!

If you are going to follow this advice, please back up your registry. You are doing it on your risk.

.dwg files could be opened by launcher or acad2015 in our case. We made sure that our registry looks as follwoing:

HKCR\Applications\AcLauncher.exe\shell\open\command

""C:\Program Files\Common Files\Autodesk Shared\AcShellEx\AcLauncher.exe" "%1"

HKCR\AutoCAD.Drawing.20\shell\open\command

"C:\program files\autodesk\autocad 2015\acad.exe" /nologo /p <<VANILLA>>

HKCR\AutoCAD.Drawing.20\shell\open\ddeexec

[open("%1")]

HKCR\AutoCAD.Drawing.20\shell\open\ddeexec\Application

AutoCAD.R20.DDE

HKCR\acad.E005.409\shell\open\command

"C:\program files\autodesk\autocad 2015\acad.exe" /nologo /p <<VANILLA>>

HKCR\acad.E005.409\shell\open\ddeexec

[open("%1")]

HKCR\acad.E005.409\shell\open\ddeexec\Application

AutoCAD.R20.DDE

This could work for you, or not, dependingly if you are using acad 2015, english, and mechanical, or some other one. acad.e005.409, will change in that situation.

Now, double clicking on a file in windows explorer always opens without splash screen (unless you set sdi  to 0, and use acad.exe to open it), and sdi has an effect. Even opening with launcher stopped having splash screen. 

If sdi is set to 0, acad.exe will open one extra dwg though. It seems that it is because of default behaviour as it is set by these registry changes.

e.g. entry:

HKCR\AutoCAD.Drawing.20\shell\open\command

"C:\program files\autodesk\autocad 2015\acad.exe" /nologo /p <<VANILLA>>

will open acad, and entry 

HKCR\AutoCAD.Drawing.20\shell\open\ddeexec

[open("%1")]

will "send" file to acad.

In the case of sdi being 0, the "empty" tab will be closed, and multiple tabs will work correctly after that.

[srdjan_zezelj]

This will work for any version of AutoCAD; just change the directory:

RegEdit --> Find

C:\program files\autodesk\autocad 2026\acad.exe   -  Here change the directory 2026 to related version

Some directories will be different but follow the path 

1.

Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\acad.9101.409\shell\open\command

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe"

change to:

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" /nologo

2.

Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications\acad.exe\shell\open\command

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" "%1"

change to:

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" "%1" /nologo

3.Skip server

Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Classes\AutoCAD.Drawing.25\protocol\StdFileEditing\server

4.

Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\AutoCADDrawingInterchange.25\shell\open\command

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" "%1"

change to:

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" "%1" /nologo

5.

Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\AutoCADDrawingStandardsFile.25\shell\open\command

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" "%1"

change to:

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" "%1" /nologo

6.Skip SheetSet

Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\AutoCADSheetSet.25\shell\open\command

F3

7.

Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\AutoCADTemplate.25\shell\open\command

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" "%1"

change to:

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" "%1" /nologo

Skip few of them until

8.

Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Autodesk\DWGCommon\shellex\Apps\{F29F85E0-4FF9-1068-AB91-08002B27B3D9}:AutoCAD

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" "%1"

change to:

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2026\acad.exe" "%1" /nologo

Skip next F3 some "print" and you are at beginning

Enjoy a lot faster AutoCAD first run 🙂

[srdjan_zezelj]

For Autocad 2025:

Regedit:

Find: C:\program files\autodesk\autocad 2025\acad.exe

1.

Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Autodesk\DWGCommon\shellex\Apps\{F29F85E0-4FF9-1068-AB91-08002B27B3D9}:AutoCAD

add to OpenLaunch: /nologo

"C:\Program Files\Autodesk\AutoCAD 2025\acad.exe" "%1" /nologo

Additional features:

To start AutoCAD without an empty "Drawing1" (or similar) file, you can adjust the STARTUP system variable to 2 or 0. Setting it to 2 will prevent a new drawing from automatically opening when AutoCAD launches. Setting it to 0 will open the drawing template specified in your options, but without displaying the Start tab. 

add to Icon properties on Desktop and Start menu /nologo at the end.