Windows 7 desktop icons keep rearranging themselves

Anonymous
2009-10-07T02:55:22+00:00

Every few days, all the icons on my Win7 desktop rearrange themselves. Usually they move to the left edge of the screen. I laboriously move all the icons back to where I like them, and 3-10 days later, they all shift left again. I've found no pattern or event that might cause this -- but it's very annoying!

I've got Win7 build 7100 running on a Dell Latitude D830 laptop. Totally standard hardware and very little non-Microsoft software. In short, it's a pretty clean system.

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Accessibility

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Anonymous
2009-10-07T17:38:17+00:00

To supplement Reyas.M.I.'s answer, Under View is the option to select the icon size, Auto arrange icons and Align icons to grid.  The Sort by option includes Name, Size, Item type and Date modified.  I suggest you check both View and Sort by.

Corrine, Microsoft MVP (Consumer Security). This posting is provided "AS IS" without warranty, and confers no rights.

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Anonymous
2009-10-07T04:51:35+00:00

Check whether "Auto Arrange" checked. To check this, right click on desktop and select "Arrange icons by".

I hope this helps.

Thanks and Regards, Reyas...

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  1. Anonymous
    2015-03-07T12:58:06+00:00

    Thanks for the reply, Kenan, but mine was already unchecked.  :(

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  2. Anonymous
    2015-03-07T08:16:22+00:00

    I had this issue of desktop icons rearranging themselves in Windows 7 whenever I would restart or reboot and what fixed my problem was the following:

    1. Right click on the desktop.
    2. Choose "Personalize".
    3. On the left hand side of this control pannel, click "Change desktop icons."
    4. There was a box that was checked next to "Allow themes to change deskop icons." When I unchecked this box and restarted my computer, all my desktop icons remained where I had them. I both shut down my computer completely and restarted my computer and after both times, all my desktop icons remained where they were.

    Note: I had changed my original desktop background, so it seems that when this box was checked, Windows 7 would rearrange the icons based on how they thought the icons would best look with whatever desktop background you have.

    Hope this helps.

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  3. Anonymous
    2015-02-09T14:11:41+00:00

    Addendum: the more screen resolutions you use , the more likely this issue will surface or frequent often.

    In my case this appeared after testing some games to see if they work, Counter Strike, Half Life, Portal, for some kids, which in turn used all kinds of resolutions when starting, and when moving back to desktop or crashing, then resolution got stuck. As I usually keep one resolution, this probably messed with those registry entries and created either mixed corrupted entries or overcrowded the list so that explorer ignored the older and important setting.

    If you use multiple resolution make sure to stick with a few.

    Clean up the rest.

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