Just recently my desktop icons show a little red box with a white x within in the lower left side. It doesn't appear on the icons of My Computer, My Documents, Internet Exployer or Recycle Bin but do on the rest. They are all operatable and don't cause any problems but I'm just curious.

Bob

Sounds like the IconCache needs refreshing.

Lots of other ways to do it, but really the simplest way is to boot in Safe Mode, let Windows and Desktop finish loading, then re-boot normally. That should force a refresh of the icon cache database.

If it proves obstinate I put something in the "Howtos"
(see left):

http://www.computing.net/howto/simp...

DerekW

Sorry I didn't respond sooner, I installed a newer HP printer earlier this week and my computer seems to be acting strangely. I spent a lot of time trying to find out why.

Strange thing this morning when I booted up, the red box was gone.

Do you think installing the printer has something to do with the red box appearing?

Bob

Even just adding one more desktop icon can sometimes cause this because the hidden file shelliconcache (your icon cache) often fails to update. Sometimes it eventually updates on its own but otherwise follow #1 or #2.

The registry fix is to help stop it happening again, the rest just fixes the current problem.

DerekW

Derek,

Before I read your post, I went through a procedure from the HP printer online support to uninstall and re-install and the printer worked great throughout the day until I turned off the printer.

I got an "illegal operation, will shut down" message. I turned on the printer and clicked on My Computer to make some checks and noticed that the computer system slowed down to a crawl. When I turned off the printer, the computer system appeared to work normally except that there were white boxes rather than the red with an X.

Tomorrow, I'll try the #2 procedure putting the icons into the recyle bin, reboot and restore them. BTW the Outlook Express Icon also has a little white box so I guess I could send it to the recycle bin and restore it.

Thanks again.

Bob

Only bin those which have the shortcut arrow (otherwise you might not get them back again - although it usually warns you).

Maybe this is tied up with your HP printer installation after all but it will do no harm to try the above.

I'm not sure where and when you are seeing the white boxes (with or without the X).

DerekW

Derek,

When I booted today, the desktop shortcuts looked normal e.i.,a little white box with an arrow in it located at the bottom left of the icon. This is the box that was red with an X or completely white. I checked my free space, which was 3.32GB and turned on the printer and made some prints.

When I turned the printer off, my computer slowed down to a crawl. I checked the free space, which was 3.07GB so somehow I lost 0.25GB doing almost nothing.

Rather than doing your procedure of deleting the shortcuts into the recycle bin, etc., I deleted one of the shortcuts that wasn't needed in order to create more cache space (sound plausible ??) and rebooted.

Again, everything looked & worked normally including the printer and when I turned it off the computer speed response was normal. In addition, I only lost about 0.02GB free space.

Let's see what happens when I boot up tomorrow.

Bob

This shelliconcache problem is well known and even with the fix it might still sometimes raise its ugly head and need jolting into rebuild.

The point of the registry mod is to allow the shelliconcache file to increase up to the maximum MS now suggest, rather than being restricted by their early small figure, which was asking for trouble. It does not mean that the file size will immediately increase - it just gives it some breathing room should it be necessary.

If this problem keeps coming back then my howto is the best way forward. The shelliconcache file might well grow a little but it is best to allow this unless you are really tight for HD space.

DerekW

Derek,

When I booted today, everthing looked & operated normally. I did some brousing & working for a while then checked the desktop and found an affected white box, something different inside it.

I then followed your procedure and deleted the shortcuts, rebooted and restored the shortcuts all at once, i.e., highlighting them as a group and restoring. Everything looks normal. I'll keep an eye on it in the future.

Thanks a bundle for the help. It's not the first time you bailed me out.

Bob

Good

Have you done the registry fix? That will help keep it good and makes no difference to HD space whatsoever.

DerekW

It's back. The normal white box with the arrow changed to a white box with three horizontal lines. I turned on the printer and the system hung up. I turned the printer off and it took time to get the system working.

Once more, I turned on the printer and it worked OK. Tried it a 3rd time and OK. The three horizontal lined white box is still there. It prints & scans copies OK.

Maybe the cause is a faulty USB cable. I had a problem with the old printer that often messaged me that the cover lid was open and used the same cable on the new printer. I'm going to get a new cable and try it.

If that doesn't work, maybe something is wrong with the printer software setup so I'm thinking about an uninstall/install again.

As for the registry fix in Copy/Paste the lines, your article stated, making sure you include the blank line at the end". I'm somewhat dense on this. I looked at the two lines and can't figure out what you mean. Do you mean that nothing should be written after the "4096" in the second line?

Bob

It just needs one linefeed below the last line of text (although a maximum of two is acceptable).

When you have the pasted text in NotePad, take the mouse to a blank part of the window at the bottom right and give it a left click. The cursor should be showing at the start of the line immediately below the last line of text. If you copy/paste from the screen in my "howto" it does include the required line feed.

The printer hangup makes me wonder if this is a different situation to that which I am assuming. However it is quite safe and sensible to carry out the registry modification and if necessary to temporarily bin the desktop "shortcuts" as a means of shaking shelliconcache into restoring.

If you still have problems afterwards then the mod will save you from a future hassle, but we must then focus on the printer. As you say, uninstall the software, reboot and install it again would be the obvious first try.

The general icon problem I've been assuming "never" causes freezes.

DerekW