Generic Icons After Bad Driver Install?

Working on a fresh install of Windows Ultimate. Got everything in place, programs, etc. Still trying to troubleshoo the built-in webcam problem (not starting up, "Need WIA driver" stuff). I found a driver for it from the manufacturer but right away I noticed it didn't work, the cam didn't work and so I attempted to roll back the driver. I then noticed that generic icons replaced many of the icons in my Start menu and task bar. I decided to do a system restore back to the point before I tried the new driver. No dice. Same problem exists. Then I went searching the forums for some ideas, many of which include deleting and rebuilding the icon cache, making the cache bigger, cleaning the dead entries from the registry, etc. I tried manually fixing the icon (replacing them) but the "change icon" command returns "cannot find" icon file. I went to look in the Windows/Installer folder and there is NOTHING in there except for a $PatchCache$ folder. The shortcuts for the generic icons do lanch their applications properly, fortunately. I've tried a lot of stuff, but nothing seems to work. This is so annoying. I put a lot of work into rebuiliding this system and I don't want to have to rebuild it all over again. All because of a stupid, lousy little web cam driver!