Locally stored pdf's will not display on two W10 machines...

I have this strange issue with viewing locally stored pdfs in both Edge and Chrome.

I posted about it here Strange issue with pdf's and Chrome on Surface Pro 3... - Windows 10 Forums but got zero response. At that time I had only observed this issue on my Surface Pro 3 and in Chrome, but now I also see a similar issue on my Asus laptop, and with Edge.

Locally stored pdfs (that is, pdfs not accessed through web links, but stored on the local HD/SSD) do not open in neither Edge nor Chrome. Double clicking a pdf in Windows Explorer, when Edge is the default pdf viewer, it asks "Do you want to open file.pdf (123kB) from DESKTOP-UX6B22BJ?". Clicking open then briefly flashes a new tab that is immediately closed, and nothing else happens. When Chrome is the default pdf viewer and a locally stored pdf is double clicked in Windows Explorer, Chrome proceeds to "download" the file into the same location making a copy of it with "(1)" added to the file name.

On my Surface Pro 3, which runs the 1607 AU, Edge behaves slightly differently, as it tries to download the file into the same directory as the original file is in, and not succeeding (I guess because of a name clash) it just hangs there saying "0.0 bytes Waiting to download - 0%"

This is *very* annoying, and as I said, it happens on two different W10 machines, both running W10x64pro.
Accessing pdfs form the web works fine, both Edge and Chrome display them as expected, this only affects pdfs stored on the local HD/SSD. And teh same thing happens if I in Chrome go to say file:///C:/Users/<me>/Downloads/ and click a pdf there, Chrome downloads it adding "(1)" to the file name.

Anyone else seen this?

Hello, can you please post an equivalent screenshot to this showing your pdf association?


You will see mine is set to Sumatra, a small fast pdf reader. That's what opens pdfs when I dclick on them, whereas on-line pdfs open in my browser.