What are these brown box icons in left bottom corner of my files??

Anonymous
2022-03-07T21:29:56+00:00

Does anyone know where these small brown box icons came from and what they mean?? I suddenly have these little brown icons (looks like a small file box) on most of my files, Word, pdf, photos, etc. I've googled the daylights out of this and apparently lots of folks have the same question but no one has an answer. I hasn't affected my ability to open files but it's really annoying! (see pic below) Does it have something to do with my upgrade to Windows 11?

Thanks!

Windows for home | Windows 11 | Performance and system failures

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Anonymous
2022-04-23T00:35:08+00:00

Had this exact same issue today. The resolution was quick no reinstall. I'm on Win11, so perhaps that was a plus in this scenario. Here's the fix that worked for me:

  1. Open windows explorer <windows-key + e>
  2. If you're using OneDrive you should see something like "OneDrive - Personal" within the left-hand pane. If so, Right-Click to access the context-menu.
  3. You should see the menu-item: "Always keep on this device", select this.
  4. Recheck your desktop; no more brown boxes, yay!

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  1. Anonymous
    2023-07-31T11:47:50+00:00

    If there's no option like 'Always keep on this device' then its possible to temporarily re-enable OneDrive with the 'OneDrive Back up files' option found on the W11 'System' settings page along the top row - but dont' actually start a backup of your files

    This logs back into OneDrive and shows a "cloud" OneDrive icon on the bottom right task bar.

    It also changed 'One Drive Personal' to '<username> - Personal' on file explorer left panel - maybe this is something new.

    There should now be extra OneDrive right-click options available.

    To disable OneDrive again right click on that cloud icon bottom right task bar and under Pause Syncing choose 'Quit OneDrive'

    If youre happy to use OneDrive and have a large disk space quota then fine, but remember MS now add OneDrive files to Outlook/Hotmail attachments and if you run out of space this might affect email function.

    As long as you've made other backup arrangements then think about checking your main document and pictures PC folders arent being synced in the background and even when OneDrive sync is turned off check there arent old files using up OneDrive cloud storage.

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  2. Anonymous
    2023-07-28T20:06:27+00:00

    I had a lot of brown boxes on images from 2018/2019 and I just did this and it got rid of all my images :) this was clearly NOT my intention…

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  3. Anonymous
    2023-07-24T22:03:17+00:00

    No, did not work

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  4. Anonymous
    2023-07-20T15:04:04+00:00

    Make sure you are signed in onto one drive. Otherwise nothing and I mean nothing works. Microsoft does NOT understand how to talk to non-computerized people. If you see One Drive-personal in the left column of explorer it does NOT mean you are signed into One Drive. It’s insane. Microsoft does not know how to fix this. After they took all my embroidery files screwed them all up and sent them back onto my computer into different folders so I could not find those embroidery files that must work together I was in tears. And the Dell computer is incapable of performing a file search on the computer after Microsoft has done its damage. Both companies should be put out of business!

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