I use Foobar2000 to play music, and for years now I've run it in what they call "portable mode".

What that means is that the program itself isn't actually "installed" in the traditional Windows sense. All "non-system" dll's required by the application are in the same folder as the executable; earlier versions of Windows find them there, and everything runs fine. But Windows 8 fails because it doesn't find them.

I want things set up this way because I keep Foobar2000 on a portable external hard drive, so I can just move it between different computers without having to go through the Windows install process.

With all previous versions of Windows, I could either directly run the application from File Explorer, or create a shortcut on the desktop with the "start in folder" property set to the actual folder containing the program. I can still use the first method, but I want a shortcut!

Is there any way to do what I want?