Green Check Marks appearing and disapparing on desktop icons?

NormAtHome · 11 Apr 2023

I have Windows 10 Pro 21H2 build 19044.2728, since my last Windows update I've had all my desktop icons alternately having green check marks and then 10 minutes later they disappear then the next day they're back and then later that day they're gone again. Since I originally built and installed Windows 10 on this computer I've always had it setup with a local account and I've never logged into my Microsoft account through Windows 10, likewise any time I see that Windows update has installed OneDrive I just uninstall it since I don't use it and have no desire to use it. Searching with Google and the forums here generally seems to indicate that this means that OneDrive is installed and backing up my data, which in my case it's not. Also I saw someone saying in a thread that Hard Drive Sentinel or something like that could cause that but I don't have that installed either. So what could be causing this and how do I turn it off permanently?

Ghot · 11 Apr 2023

NormAtHome said:

I have Windows 10 Pro 21H2 build 19044.2728, since my last Windows update I've had all my desktop icons alternately having green check marks and then 10 minutes later they disappear then the next day they're back and then later that day they're gone again. Since I originally built and installed Windows 10 on this computer I've always had it setup with a local account and I've never logged into my Microsoft account through Windows 10, likewise any time I see that Windows update has installed OneDrive I just uninstall it since I don't use it and have no desire to use it. Searching with Google and the forums here generally seems to indicate that this means that OneDrive is installed and backing up my data, which in my case it's not. Also I saw someone saying in a thread that Hard Drive Sentinel or something like that could cause that but I don't have that installed either. So what could be causing this and how do I turn it off permanently?

Try uninstalling OneDrive, with REVO Uninstaller (free)... AND do the scan for leftovers also.
In REVO, you'll find OneDrive under... Windows Apps

Download Revo Uninstaller Freeware - Free and Full Download

There's also this...

Uninstall OneDrive in Windows 10

Malneb · 12 Apr 2023

try rebuilding the icon cache one drive syncs all kinds of stuff when its installed so if it was installed at one time then this may be the problem as a result.

Rebuild Icon Cache in Windows 10

dalchina · 12 Apr 2023

Without a screenshot, we can only assume your belief that Onedrive is involved is correct. There are other possible causes, as you know.

Be very careful how you uninstall Onedrive. Once it's been in action. you need to disable synching and integration and check where you're up to. People have got into a bit of a mess.

There is a range of tutorials available.. in the huge searchable Tutorials section.

If data appears to disappear from your drive after uninstalling Onedrive, it should still be in your online Onedrive account as versioned backups.

OneDrive can be a pain.

RickC · 12 Apr 2023

This has been an issue for years and isn't going to be fixed by Microsoft. (According to famed Microsoft developer Raymond Chen way back in 2019, it's a mixture of laziness, inertia and the knowledge that any fix would be complex with perhaps unexpected consequences... and more trouble than it's worth in terms of any real benefits. See here for more info.)

The system reserves 4 shell icon overlay slots for itself, leaving 11 free for use by other apps. There are multiple issues with this, not least of which is that apps fight amongst themselves for those remaining 11 spots... and it's decided by the order in which the apps write their overlay entries in the registry. (See this Which Dropbox icon is for which Icon Overlay Identifier name? thread which discusses overlay order in the registry.)

Many third-party apps (like OneDrive, GoogleDrive, DropBox, etc.) all use the same or similar icon overlays (stored in the registry at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ShellIconOverlayIdentifiers). See List of shell icon overlay identifiers for more info, including pictures.)

In my experience the sudden appearance of unexpected icon overlays is often the result of the OS running low on system resources, particularly GDI. When this happens, internal refreshes of the desktop can misuse the wrong overlay, depending on the order in which they are written to the registry. When this happens I find a restart is enough to change the icon overlays back to how they should be. However, it will happen again... and is based upon the number of icons used not just on the desktop but within apps (toolbars, etc.) Available resources eventually run low and the usual sign is desktop icons misbehaving.

If you want to be more proactive, perhaps the easiest way of preventing the unwanted shell icon overlays is to use Sysinternals/TechNet's Autoruns.

Run it as administrator and scroll down to the shell icon overlay sections then remove the ticks from the checkboxes of the icon overlays you don't want to see. For example:

Restarting your device should now leave your desktop icons as you want, because Autoruns will have moved the registry entries for the unwanted overlays.

Just be aware that this method isn't foolproof, because some apps like GoogleDrive just re-enable them by writing new registry entries the next time they carry out an automatic update. Here's my registry showing I disabled GoogleDrive's icon overlays twice using Autoruns... and new entries were written by GoogleDrive soon afterwards.

Hope this helps...