Solved all shortcut icons disappear

[gordon55y]

Hi,
There are two flavors of shortcuts, "*lnk" and "*url".
My "*url" shortcuts are not a problem.
However, all my "*lnk" shortcuts have been deleted (552) :-(

There is an MS documented issue when there are 4 or more broken desktop shortcuts.
If there are more than 4 broken desktop icons, then all the *desktop* icons will be deleted.
My icons that were deleted were not on the desktop.
As a matter of fact, I have several desktop lnk shortcuts that were not deleted.
So I think my problem is different.

I had several system crashes, and that is when the lnk shortcuts were deleted.
I counted the number of lnk shortcuts from my archive backup.

At first I thought this was a HDD going south.
But all my other files appear to be intact.
So this seems like a software problem, not a hardware problem.

I plan to run MS disk check, and then copy the lnk shortcuts from backup.

I searched around and did not find any report similar to mine.
Is there anything I should try before running disk check and copying shortcuts back?

I see that lnk shortcuts at C:/users/xxxx have not been deleted.
I keep my files at C:/mystuff not C:/users/xxxx
I wonder if my odd location for files somehow caused this?
thanks for reading

win7 pro
laptop
new WD 320G disk

 

[Brink]

Hello Gordon,

This sounds like it could be the System Maintenance troubleshooter doing this. If so, then turning it off should stop this.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/165701-system-maintenance-troubleshooter-turn-off.html

 

[gordon55y]

Hi Brink,
I see that turning off System Maintenance Troubleshooter can sometimes restore shortcut icons.
I turned off SMT and my shortcut icons are still missing :-(

There was something else that was kinda weird.
Using windows explorer, I went into a folder that had missing shortcut icons.
I did a search for the name of one of the missing icons.
And it found the icon, but if I tried to execute the icon, windows explorer could not execute it.
When I restarted search, it worked normally.

Anything else I should try before running check disk and restoring shortcut icons?

 

[medenko]

something similar happened to my links

13-9-2016 7-34-01 - kmetek's library

 

[medenko]

this the solution?

cajuntiger has just replied to a thread you have subscribed to entitled - all shortcut icons disappear - in the General Discussion forum of Windows 7 Help Forums.

This thread is located at:
http://www.sevenforums.com/general-discussion/400648-all-shortcut-icons-disappear-new-post.html

Here is the message that has just been posted:
***************
You can correct this by either restoring the registry key from another working computer or manually replacing the registry key.

WARNING: Using Registry Editor incorrectly can cause serious, system-wide problems that may require you to reinstall Windows NT to correct them. Microsoft cannot guarantee that any problems resulting from the use of Registry Editor can be solved. Use this tool at your own risk.

To restore the registry key from another computer, perform the following steps:
1. Start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe) and select the following subkey:
HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.lnk
2. From the Edit menu, click Delete.
3. On another Windows NT 4.0 computer, start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe) and select the registry key HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.lnk.
4. From the Registry menu, click Save Key.
5. Copy this file to the computer exhibiting the problem or to a floppy disk.
6. On the computer exhibiting the problem, recreate the registry key by selecting HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT and then from the Edit menu, click Add Key. Type .lnk for the key name.
7. Select the new key, click Restore from the Registry menu, and select the file from the other computer or floppy disk.
8. Quit Registry Editor and restart the computer. Test a Program menu item or shortcut.

To manually enter the information, perform the following steps:
1. Start Registry Editor (Regedt32.exe), select the HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT subkey, and then click Add Key on the Edit menu.
2. In the Key Name box type ".lnk" (without quotation marks), and then click OK. Note that you should leave the Class box blank.
3. In the Add Value dialog box, click OK to leave the Value Name blank, and click REG_SZ in the Data Type list.
4. In the String Editor box, type "lnkfile" (without quotation marks), and then click OK.
5. Select the .lnk key you just re-created under the HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT subkey. On the Edit menu, click Add Key and then type "ShellNew" (without quotation marks). Note that you should leave the Class box blank.
6. Click Add Value on the Edit menu, type "command" (without quotation marks) in the Data Name box, click REG_SZ in the Data name box, and then type "RunDLL32 AppWiz.Cpl,NewLinkHere %1" (without quotation marks) as the string value.
7. Quit Registry Editor, and then restart the computer.

 

[Brink]

Hi Brink,
I see that turning off System Maintenance Troubleshooter can sometimes restore shortcut icons.
I turned off SMT and my shortcut icons are still missing :-(

There was something else that was kinda weird.
Using windows explorer, I went into a folder that had missing shortcut icons.
I did a search for the name of one of the missing icons.
And it found the icon, but if I tried to execute the icon, windows explorer could not execute it.
When I restarted search, it worked normally.

Anything else I should try before running check disk and restoring shortcut icons?

Turning off SMT is more of in hopes to stop it from deleting the shortcuts again in the future.

This can happen if the search Index has not finished updating (rebuid) itself for the changes. It was still showing the missing shortcut from the Index while the shortcut was actually no longer at the indexed location.

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/17880-index-rebuild.html

 

[gordon55y]

Hi Brink,
When I do a system restore, the final message is:
System restore completed ........
Your documents have not been affected.

What does "documents" mean?

Does it include files in C:/mystuff
Does it include shortcuts in C:/mystuff

Does it include files in my desktop?
Does it include shortcuts in my desktop?

thanks

 

[Brink]

It means that files in your personal folders haven't been affected.

 

[gordon55y]

What does "personal" mean?
Are you referring to the owner of a file/folder?
Does that include shortcuts/files/subfolders in my desktop?
Does that include folders/subfolders/shortcuts I create at C:

It means that files in your personal folders haven't been affected.

 

[Brink]

Sorry. Your personal folders are the folders in your "C:\Users\(user name)" profile folder.

For example: Music, Documents, Downloads, etc....

 

[gordon55y]

Does that include C:\Users\(user name)\Desktop

Sorry. Your personal folders are the folders in your "C:\Users\(user name)" profile folder.

For example: Music, Documents, Downloads, etc....

 

[Brink]

Correct.

 

[gordon55y]

oooh,
If desktop is personal then restore should not remove the desktop shortcut
in the example below.

1) create restore point.
2) create a new file in desktop and make a new shortcut (lnk) in desktop.
3) restore step 1
4) the new shortcut in desktop is gone.
but the new file is not.

 

[Brink]

Yep, it's not suppose to, but that's why I would always recommend to back up anything that you don't want to lose to be safe.

 

[gordon55y]

ok, thanks for the advice

Yep, it's not suppose to, but that's why I would always recommend to back up anything that you don't want to lose to be safe.