Unable to change background Windows 7 Home Premium

Anonymous
2009-11-27T19:00:12+00:00

**Original Title**

Windows 7 Desktop Background Picture won't change. Was working fine, changing everyday, then one day, stopped changing and now stuck on the same picture for 2 weeks.

The desktop backgrounds were working fine (previous 2 weeks ago), picture would change everyday. I downloaded all the other themes (ex. Brazil, China, Spain, etc.). At first these other themes worked fine and then all of a sudden, the desktop background picture won't change.

Another problem: under "Control Panel > Appearance and Personalization > Personalization" window, when I click on "Desktop Background" link or icon on bottom left and the picture locations are displayed, I can't check or uncheck pictures. When I try to clear all check marks or select all check marks, they seem to disappear (the check marks) randomly and then reappear randomly. Sometimes some check marks will stay and then others will disappear despite selecting "Clear all" or "Select all" (doesn't matter which) and seemingly random pictures are selected or deselected in no particular pattern. And then I tried manually selecting and deselecting each picture check mark and same thing, check marks would randomly stay or else disappear.

Bottom line is I am unable to change anything in "Desktop Background". And I have had the same background picture for 2 weeks unable to change it. Have clicked on every button or drop down menu like "Change picture every:" to 10 seconds, 30 seconds, etc. and still nothing.

I tried finding a work around solution like right clicking on different pictures in Windows Explorer and selecting "Set as desktop background" but literally nothing happens. I tried viewing several pictures in "Windows Photo Viewer" then right click on "Set as desktop background" and then an error pops up "This image can't be set as wallpaper. An internal error occurred."

I have all the latest windows updates. I haven't tried anything in safe mode because I really don't know windows 7 and safe mode turns the desktop background off, anyways, doesn't it? Don't really want to do a system restore for something so small or re-install. Please advise other things I can try!

Should also mention I tried deleting all the additional themes I downloaded to see if these caused problems... and yes I used antivirus and spyware several times (using "Shaw Secure" made by F-Secure). Still same problem. Also scanned with Ad-Aware (although had to turn off F-Secure to do this). Still nothing wrong.

It's a small problem I can live with but also annoying.

Should also mention this is a brand new pc with Windows 7 installed on it (no other OS was installed on it).

Windows for home | Previous Windows versions | Accessibility

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Anonymous
2009-12-01T10:31:14+00:00

should be noted that when you delete the content in the .ini file you need to reboot

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Anonymous
2009-11-30T19:30:10+00:00

Open this with Windows Explorer: %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Themes\ and tell me what you see?

When choosing only one image for the desktop background there should be only TranscodedWallpaper.jpg and the slideshow.ini should be empty. Is there something inside the .ini file? Maybe it would be possible to force some changes removing the content of the .ini file

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  1. Anonymous
    2010-10-06T07:07:11+00:00

    Hello Allisterr,

    The root cause of that issue in your case, might be some application which is launched at start and changing some setting like wallpaper by itself. Here is similar topic:Why does my Windows 7 theme keep changing everytime I reboot?

    The person there was talking about "Acer Ferrari Wallpaper", but it can be also different application in your case. You need to investigate what application are launched at start. Probably it has it's own icon at notification are at the right side of the taskbar. You may need to change its setting to prevent farther changes.

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  2. Anonymous
    2010-10-14T02:09:36+00:00

    hi umm i have had a problem like this for a long time i have done all of the above and still have no answers. you see i have deleted my TranscodedWallpaper.jpgfile and then watched it come back in the folder when i use personlize, for a split second it takes up my new image and then changes back to win 7 starter desktop image. Its making me go crazy hope you can help. :(

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  3. Anonymous
    2010-10-23T04:13:43+00:00

    Some photo viewing programs include a "set wallpaper" function.   One of the free ones is called Faststone & you can download it from the Internet.     I installed  Faststone.   Then I copied the file I wanted to use as wallpaper into  the ordinary Windows 7 "My Pictures" folder,  opened it with Faststone, and clicked on the Faststone "set as Wallpaper" command.    It's  working - so far.

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