The desktop icon for Internet Explorer has gone from its normal light blue to a darker blue (that looks worse). As far as I can recall, this didn’t follow an update or anything, I just minimised a window a week or so ago, and there it was, smiling its ugly face at me.
If I create a shortcut to it, then it also has the dark icon. If I right-click on the shortcut, go to properties, then change the icon, I can choose the nice light-coloured one, and it gets applied. But it’s not possible to do this with the original.
Example of dark one here.
Example of light one here.
I did a Google search and found one article, on winxptutor.com - they suggested entering something into the “Run” box which seems to refresh a DLL or something. I did this, but it had no effect. They also suggested running a program called Tweak - I had a look at this but couldn’t find anything that looked like it would help. The registry values that winxptutor stated are correct. I couldn’t find anything on Microsoft’s site.
You didn’t mention which version of Windows you’re running but I’ve run into this issue a lot with Windows 98. For some reason, older versions of Windows “forget” that the icons can be displayed in a lot more color. I would try deleting the shortcut and replacing it with a fresh one.
:smack: XP SP2
The Internet Explorer Icon in XP isn’t a shortcut like most - it has some special properties, so it’s not so easy to delete it and put it back. I did try that with this Tweak program I mentioned, but it didn’t have an effect.
I do recall that sort of thing happening with my old 98 PC, although not the exact same symptoms.
Search Google for a program called TweakUI and install it. Then, under the “Repair” category in there, there should be a “Rebuild icons” option. That should fix it.
If not, it is possible that the icon colour depth has been turned down. I’m not sure if this is still possible with XP, though… On closer inspection, I can’t find the option to do it, so it probably doesn’t exist on XP anymore.
Thanks for that - I’d not found the “Repair” option in Tweak :smack:. It seems to have sorted it for now - as long as it doesn’t come back when I reboot all should be fine
