Solved Multiple icons showing in smallest size when using Extra Large Icons

[RoadkillSD]

Any luck in finding a solution? I have the exact same issue. Games folder on the desktop with shortcuts to my games, all with custom icons I know have 256x256 size and half of them display as small icons.

Nope. I have a post up on Microsoft Answers too and have yet to get a response in five months. Some BS.

 

[Tenkai]

Solution

I think I may have found a solution to everyone's problem..

Right Click any Icon file. (The *.ico)
Select "Properties"
Under the General Tab
Where it says "Opens with"
Select "Change"
Select the Paint application under recommended programs.

For some reason mine was trying to open with Windows Photo Viewer and it was being weird.. I stumbled across this on accident. After I changed it to Paint, all the pictures went normal on Large and Extra Large state. I really hope this works for you.

 

[Arc]

Thanks for posting your solution. As this is not a very uncommon issue this time, it will help a lot of other members in future.

 

[RoadkillSD]

I think I may have found a solution to everyone's problem..

Right Click any Icon file. (The *.ico)
Select "Properties"
Under the General Tab
Where it says "Opens with"
Select "Change"
Select the Paint application under recommended programs.

For some reason mine was trying to open with Windows Photo Viewer and it was being weird.. I stumbled across this on accident. After I changed it to Paint, all the pictures went normal on Large and Extra Large state. I really hope this works for you.

I got to going in and renaming the icon file to Name 1.ico or Name 2.ico and relinking the newly renamed icon file and it would fix the size issue until it failed again then renaming it back to the original Name.ico and after that it stopped. It hasn't happened in over 2 months since I did that twice to each one that was messing up so if it starts up again, I'll try this. Thanks for letting us know!

 

[therusseller]

Solution

Changing the default program to Open with Paint didn't work. Although I found a solution for those of you that still have this problem. The problem is Steam creates "Internet Shortcuts". If it created a regular .exe shortcut your icons would stay the same size. There are two solutions to this problem:


1) Create a Shortcut to the desired games .exe file in the games directory (Example: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\Call of Duty Advanced Warfare\s1_mp64_ship.exe). Note: The problem with this solution is that some Steam Games will not run directly from the .exe shortcut. So I have another solution for those video games that will not load from an exe shortcut. Here you guys go:



1. Search and Run Task Scheduler

2. Create Task
a)Enter the target name(Video Game) in the General tab (Example: CallofDutyAW

3.Select New in the Actions tab
a)Program/Script: "C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\Steam.exe"
b)Add Arguments: Steam Internet Shortcut Target (EXAMPLE: steam://rungameid/209660)
Note: To find this create a shortcut for the desired video game from the Steam Library then Right Click the shortcut you just created and copy the URL. You will then Past it into the Add Arguments field in Task Manager



4. Right click>Creat New>Shortcut
a)Location of the Item: schtasks /run /tn TARGET (You assigned this in the General Tab in Task Scheduler)
b)Name for This Shortcut: Enter the name you would like the Shortcut to be named.

5. Change the Icon
a) Right click Shortcut>Properties>Change Icon
b) Click Browse and search for the icon you'd like to use for the shortcut in the game directory (Example: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\Call of Duty Advanced Warfare\s1_mp64_ship.exe

6. Run to make sure it is working correctly!

 

[RoadkillSD]

Finally fixed!

Changing the default program to Open with Paint didn't work. Although I found a solution for those of you that still have this problem. The problem is Steam creates "Internet Shortcuts". If it created a regular .exe shortcut your icons would stay the same size. There are two solutions to this problem:


1) Create a Shortcut to the desired games .exe file in the games directory (Example: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\Call of Duty Advanced Warfare\s1_mp64_ship.exe). Note: The problem with this solution is that some Steam Games will not run directly from the .exe shortcut. So I have another solution for those video games that will not load from an exe shortcut. Here you guys go:



1. Search and Run Task Scheduler

2. Create Task
a)Enter the target name(Video Game) in the General tab (Example: CallofDutyAW

3.Select New in the Actions tab
a)Program/Script: "C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\Steam.exe"
b)Add Arguments: Steam Internet Shortcut Target (EXAMPLE: steam://rungameid/209660)
Note: To find this create a shortcut for the desired video game from the Steam Library then Right Click the shortcut you just created and copy the URL. You will then Past it into the Add Arguments field in Task Manager



4. Right click>Creat New>Shortcut
a)Location of the Item: schtasks /run /tn TARGET (You assigned this in the General Tab in Task Scheduler)
b)Name for This Shortcut: Enter the name you would like the Shortcut to be named.

5. Change the Icon
a) Right click Shortcut>Properties>Change Icon
b) Click Browse and search for the icon you'd like to use for the shortcut in the game directory (Example: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\Call of Duty Advanced Warfare\s1_mp64_ship.exe

6. Run to make sure it is working correctly!

This didn't actually work for me because you are still linking to the web url script. I know it's been almost a year since this was last updated but I felt I had to provide my fix for all you poor bastards still having this issue like me (as it carried over into Win10 as well). I finally fixed this for both my Win7 and Win10 setups doing the following:

Create a scheduled task just as therusseller stated but instead of an argument of "steam://rungameid/[gameID], use the old WinXP days argument Steam used to use to launch apps with "-applaunch [gameID]".

So for example, for Afterfall InSanity, which has ID of 224420, the task action will be to run "C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\Steam.exe" with an argument of "-applaunch 224420".

Create your shortcut as normal to C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe /run /tn "Name of Task" and select your icon.

Note: I created a sub folder in the task scheduler called 'Game Shortcuts' so they weren't all mixed up with my other Windows tasks so I had to include "\Game Shortcuts\" in front of all my task names to make it work. So for the above example, I had created the task as "AfterfallInsanity" so my shortcut is C:\Windows\System32\schtasks.exe /run /tn "\Game Shortcuts\AfterfallInsanity".

Hope this helps everyone. I know it is a PitA for those of us with 100s of games installed and have to do this for them all. Good luck!

 

[JonW]

This is a Windows handling of "internet shortcuts" problem.. not a Steam problem. Specifically in the way that it handles the icons of custom "internet shortcuts". Every time the icon cache is cleared, it randomly decides a bunch of new icons in which to take the 256 icon and display at the max size of 48x48 (or 64x64). I know that it's using the 256 pixel icon to do this, because I have a different icon for 256 than for everything else. In this case a Youtube thumbnail for 256, and a regular Youtube logo for 64 and 48. It will resize the 256 thumbnail icon but only below it's regular size. That's probably unclear.. so I'll try to clarify.. it's showing it at a quarter of the size and only resizes it in the last 10% of the range (before switching to content view). This is while holding control and mouse scrolling. It seems like it resizes it from 64 down to 48 but it's hard to say the exact number.

It's definitely 'finding' this 256 pixel icon, it's just displaying it too small.. for no apparent reason. Randomly.

It's really easy to pinpoint this and rule out other factors because I have made 100's of icons this year and haven't had any issues until now. Nothing else has changed other than trying to have "multiple" .url shortcuts within the same folder using different custom icons.

Up until now, all of my icons have been dispersed so that it's been 1 shortcut per folder.. or multiple icons using the same icon. This is specifically an internet shortcut + custom icon + lots of icons in the same folder problem.

I really can't see how Task Scheduler can help with this but maybe after some experiments I can learn more about this issue.

At this point it's completely random, and completely frustrating and is 1 of 1000 (growing) reasons why I think Microsoft is dodgy.. but anyway.

I've been thinking about making some custom file extensions for different common websites like IMDB, Wiki and Youtube.. and having additional metadata in the files (that are simply text files that act as INI files) specific to that website, for example views or the channel name for YT.. rating, or starring actors for IMDB. And for these things to show in the 'preview pane'. It's possible to create "preview handlers" for these things. But I can't even think about going forward with that part of things until I find some kind of solution for the icon thing. It's 2018 and I'm anticipating that no one has ever found an solution for this and that Microsoft has never even looked at it. Either way.. I will try.

I don't have high hopes but I'll post something if I have any success.

 

[Ryoto]

The Solution posted by Tenkai works for me. When the windows is trying to render icons, I think it depends on the default program for ICO file. In the same way as with other files, like PNG, AVI, etc. It changes icon based on its default program, so I think the default windows photo viewer is the real culprit here.

If you change this default program to any other, paint, photofiltre, any internet browser... it will render all icons in 256x256. There is still that white border around them, but at least they are all in 256 resolution.