The icons used in Windows are saved in an icon cache, which has been invented to optimize the display of icons, so it doesn’t have to open every exe-/dll-files and scan for icon images all the time.

This caching can become corrupted and lead to garbled/fuzzy/wrong icons:

  • An icon are changed to a different random icon
  • Several icons are drawn on top of each other
  • An icon becomes all black

There are different solutions that might help:

  • Restarting the computer will solve the problem for most people
  • Recreate the Icon-Cache by changing icon size (Another way is to Rebuild Icons in Tweak UI):
    1. Open Control Panel and double click Display-applet
    2. Select Appearance-tab and in Item-dropdown select Icon
    3. Increase Size and press Apply-button
    4. Decrease Size back to old value and press Apply-button
    5. Press Ok-button
  • Increase the limitation for the iconcache with this STRING value:

    [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \Software \Microsoft \Windows \CurrentVersion \Explorer]
    Max Cached Icons = “2048” (Range = “100”-“4096”, Default = “512”)

  • Recreate the Icon-Cache file by deleting it
    1. Delete the hidden file ShellIconCache (Win9x/NT4/2k):

      C:\Windows\ShellIconCache or C:\Winnt\ShellIconCache

      Note in WinXP each user has their own file that is called Iconcache.db:

      C:\Documents and Settings\Your User Name\Local Settings\Application Data\Iconcache.db

      Note in Vista each user has their own file that is called Iconcache.db:

      %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Iconcache.db

    2. Close down all explorer.exe processes using the Task Manager (Or else it will create a faulty file during logoff/restart)
    3. Use the Task Manager (CTRL+SHIFT+ESC) to launch the explorer.exe again (Or press CTRL+ALT+DEL to perform a restart/logoff)
    4. When the Windows Explorer (explorer.exe) starts again, it will recreate a correct Icon-Cache file

  • Uninstall Tweak UI (If installed) using the Add/Remove applet in the Control Panel.

    To uninstall by command line (WinNT+):

    rundll32.exe syssetup.dll,SetupInfObjectInstallAction DefaultUninstall 4 %Windir%\Inf\Tweakui.Inf

    To uninstall by command line (Win9x):

    rundll.exe setupx.dll,InstallHinfSection DefaultUninstall 4 C:\Windows\Inf\Tweakui.Inf

More Info MS KB132668
More Info MS KB133733
More Info MS KB146213
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More Info MS KB216165