i just installed Linux mint xfce a couple days ago. i have successfully installed all updates. when i downloaded/installed the driver for my graphics card, all the items on my desktop disappeared. i cannot see the default background any more. i can still see the task bar, though. is this a setting that needs to be changed? could this be caused by a faulty installation of the driver or OS? i haven't tried disabling the driver yet... i had the driver running when i had ubuntu running and it worked fine. i don't know if the desktop disappearing is related to the graphics card driver or not. i am willing to try all suggestions.

You can try to play with it and might fix it eventually. I'd just re-install the whole thing again and either try that update first or never put it in and be happy. "Best Practices", Event viewer, host file, perfmon, antivirus, anti-spyware, Live CD's, backups, are in my top 10