W11 Autoplay setting reads current Android phone under old name

Question

Issue:

Windows 11 Autoplay default only has 2 options (Take No Action and Ask me every time) available for my current device (under its old phone name), but all options available to everything else, meaning I can't transfer files between phone and PC.

IDK why this happened, and why it has only 2 options for a particular device.

Background:

Changed my Android phone's name (One UI version 8.5, Android version 16) several months ago without issues. Recently Windows Autoplay is showing the phone's old name in the autoplay options pop up. After some trouble shooting, I found the 2 different names for the same phone under autoplay option settings (Current and Old name). Current name has all the file transfer functions but phone's old name only have TAC and AMET.

Tried so far:

Changing phone's name back and forth. PC keeps reading phone under old name.

Using different ports, different cables, different android phones. All of those work fine.

Updated portable devices, Ports, and USB drivers. No apparent improvement.

Thanks for reading.

Answer 1

Hello Char C,

This might be a stale Autoplay entry. Windows keeps per-device Autoplay preferences in the registry, and it seems the old phone name is stuck as a separate device with limited options, while your renamed device is treated as new. Clearing those saved preferences usually forces Windows to rebuild them fresh.

• Reset Autoplay defaults: Go to Settings > Bluetooth & devices > AutoPlay, and toggle Autoplay off then on. Or via Control Panel > AutoPlay, scroll down and click Reset all defaults.
• Clear the stale entry (registry): Back up first, then look under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\AutoplayHandlers — specifically the device-name subkeys under it. Removing the stale old-name entries lets Windows re-detect the phone cleanly on next connect.

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