Office Icons are all missing/replaced by generic white icons

Anonymous
2010-08-03T08:01:12+00:00

For some reason all my office products (word, excel, outlook, access etc.) icons in the start menu and desktop task bar have all been replaced by the generic white icons.

I am unable to uninstall or repair this. I believe (from what I've read on the internet) that it is connected to the "C:\windows\installer" folder and the Office installer files.

Can this problem be solved without having to re-install windows ( as that is the only way I think its possible to be albe to reset the office suite).

Cheers,

Jurgens

Microsoft 365 and Office | Install, redeem, activate | For home | Windows

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

0 comments No comments
Answer accepted by question author
Anonymous
2011-09-24T16:39:18+00:00

I had the same issue as everyone here and I think I've FINALLY figured out a solution!

Go to c:/Program Files/Microsoft Office/Office 14

Right click on each program icon individually and unpin from BOTH your Taskbar and/or Start Menu. (e.g. EXCEL.EXE, MSACCESS.EXE, MSPUB.EXE, OUTLOOK.EXE, POWERPNT.EXE, WINWORD.EXE, etc.)

Then right click and select  "Pin to Start Menu" (not to Taskbar).

Do this for each program you want to eventually make it onto your Taskbar.

Now go to Start and then for each program (that should now show in start menu with the actual Microsoft Office icon), right click and select "Pin to Taskbar".

You can then Remove each one from the Start Menu if you wish by right clicking again and selecting "Remove from this List".

Your icons should now be back to their original format.

I've rebooted my system several times so far and the icons have remained.

Hopefully this will work for everyone else as well!

Good Luck!!!

Was this answer helpful?

600+ people found this answer helpful.
0 comments No comments

123 additional answers

Sort by: Most helpful
  1. Anonymous
    2017-07-03T13:44:20+00:00

    If you right click any program icon on the Windows taskbar, you will get a menu option that offers unpin from the taskbar.

    If you right click a program icon in the Windows Start Menu you will see a menu option 'More' select that and there is another sub menu with Pin to taskbar. This isn't rocket science.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments No comments
  2. Anonymous
    2017-07-03T12:42:45+00:00

    Could you please show with print screens, what does it mean to unpin from Taskbar? 

    Many thanks?

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments No comments
  3. Anonymous
    2017-06-23T21:01:00+00:00

    I have had this problem for a while now and finally found the solution. I have tried everything I found online until I finally searched for {90150000-0011-0000-0000-0000000FF1CE} . This is the folder you are missing in C:\Windows\Installer. I found a version online, copied it to the right place, and now (almost) everything is back on track.

    I hope that this solution is spread out since it seems common.

    And Microsoft, putting the icons in an install folder? Really?

    I had this problem with one of my workstations at work. Interestingly enough for me the file folder, although named with a different number, was not missing from my C:\Windows\Installer folder. Neither were the contents. All the icon.exe files were there but somehow they had apparently became corrupted as they too had generic icons.

    I tracked down the files from one of my other workstations and copied them into the folder of the affected workstation and rebooted.

    At first I didn't think it had worked because the shortcut icons on the desktop and the icons for the files associated to Office programs had not changed. However, it did fix the shortcut icons on the Start Menu.

    On a whim I ran ie4uinit.exe -ClearIconCache again from an Administrative Command Line and it fixed the desktop shortcut icons as well as the file icons associated with Office programs. I had run this command before with no success.

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments No comments
  4. Anonymous
    2017-01-11T13:33:22+00:00

    I FOUND THE ANSWER!

    This bug really annoyed me for a while. The solution is as follows:

    Right click on the tile (or search the offending application on start menu and then right click);

    Click in "More"

    Click in "Show file location" (or similar, my Windows is in a diferente language)

    Long story short, you'll be redirected to the shortcuts presente in C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs. Those are the shortcuts displayed not only when you pin a program to Start screen/menu, but when simply displaying on the taskbar as well. For some reason those shortcuts sometimes "lose" their icons, and that's the cause of this strange behaviour. Simply correct the icons on the offending application and it should do the trick.

    Best regards!

    Ruivo

    Was this answer helpful?

    0 comments No comments