Yep, love this feature also.

It's not like the GAC changes that often. Why can't they just load the GAC in the background after VS starts the first time and cache the results somewhere and update the cache when the GAC changes. In fact, doesn't the "C" in GAC mean "Cache"? Why does it take so long to scan through it? Is there no indexing?

It still seems like they didn't solve the problem, just glossed over it. *sigh*

Do they at least cache the cache in memory so you only have to suffer the wait time ONCE per app launch?

What I should like is the ability to drag'n drop an assembly to the list of references too.

Finally they did this!

1. I very rarely add references from GAC - my policy is to have all the referenced DLLs in my VCS.

2. Also, the "recent" tab in the dialog helps a lot for adding stuff already added in other projects in the solution.

3. Resharper makes adding references much easier, since it can detect and add references automatically (again, for stuff already added in other projects.

Igor Brejc, regarding 3rd: this works only for project references, but often we need browse for dlls.

In VS2k8, give Rory Becker's CR_QuickAddReference a shot: code.google.com/.../CR_QuickAddReference  It uses DXCore, which is a free plugin framework (and is part of CodeRush, for those that might already have it).  It caches results.

In the past, I've done separate VS plugins for "Add File Reference..." and "Add Project Reference..." that are far more common for me than adding a GAC or COM reference, but I don't have the code for them lying anywhere handy.

Igor Brejc's 3rd point works for both project references and .dll's for me, but that may prove to be a feature of our project layouts.