Apps / Software :: Start Menu Icons And Shortcuts Not Refreshing / Updating
Aug 28, 2014
Within the last month or so, shortcuts on the start menu haven't been refreshing when their respective icons actually change. This only pertains to 3rd party programs and games--not those downloaded from the Microsoft store or included in Windows by default. For example, Steam recently changed the design of their logo. This change was never reflected in the start menu.
There are at least several other apps, like the PortableApps launcher, that the same is happening to. I've actually had to go to the entry in appdata and completely remove them and re-add them to get the changes to show. Never had an issue with anything like this until relatively recently, though I can't place one particular event as being definitive. It may have been like this for even longer and I wouldn't have known until a few things updated anyway.
See system spec for details, as everything is up-to-date. It would be nice for software to update icons and have those changes reflected rather than having to add manually.
In the midst of trying to remove bloatware I have been removing bloatware and its shortcuts from the start menu and respective folders. However, I am running into a snag. There was a wildtangent games folder installed with a bunch of games. I remove everything associated with it, but there are still links in the start menu. I checked the start menu folders and I cannot find the links and whenever I click open file location it brings up the came browser and it shows a bunch of blank links. Pics are attached.
I've installed some software that runs on the Desktop. On Windows earlier than 8, it installs some shortcuts in its part of the start menu that run various configuration programs. When you want to reconfigure the software you click the start menu, find the entry/folder for the software then click the shortcut for the required configuration program.
But these shortcuts do not actually run an exe file. Looking at their properties, their targets are actually of the form (for example):
I just bought a new Dell with Windows 8, and after installing Office 2010, I inadvertently deleted the Office program shortcuts from the Start Menu as I was placing them on the Desktop. They're also gone from the All apps menu. how to put them back?
I've been getting a "File Access Denied, You'll need to provide administrator permission to rename this file", popup window even with UAC turned off?
The files in question are shortcuts in the C:ProgramDataMicrosoftWindowsStart MenuPrograms. It also happens in C:UsersUser-NameAppDataRoamingMicrosoftWindowsStart MenuPrograms.
Basically what I'm doing is renaming the title of the tiles/programs displayed on the Metro Start screen. If there is a better way I'm all for that as having to click continue every time is getting old.
The icons on my start menu and text were about right size but today something happened and they got a lot smaller. Now the text is hard to read with a mag glass. How to make them big again?
How to fix the 'Desktop icons not refreshing' bug in 8.1 ?
It's weird because on first boot it works fine for a few hours, but then randomly decides to stop working, so by the afternoon/evening I have to start manually refreshing the desktop when I copy stuff to it, or the icons do not show up
Starting to get irritating so looking for a fix, seen a few reg fixes for Win 7 etc but doesn't seem to work for 8.1
So I upgraded to windows 8.1 a few weeks ago from 7 and I'm loving the performance boosts I get while playing games, the one thing that bugs me and it happens randomly, sometimes once a day, sometimes never happens at all for a day or two, sometimes it happens every couple hours.
What happens is that my taskbar will completely empty and then reload everything and my desktop will do the same, desktop background goes blank icons disappear and then suddenly wallpaper comes back and all my icons keep shifting all over the place between my two monitors.
I've also noticed if I have my taskbar set to my main monitor (left) when it refreshes like that it forces the taskbar to move to my secondary monitor (right).
What could be causing this issue? I do use Start8, but so far searching bugs on that nothing seems to show anything similar to what I'm getting and since it's happening to my desktop and not just the taskbar I've figured it has to be something with windows.
My PC specs are as follows:
i7 4770k Gigabyte R9 280x 16GB G-Skill DDR3 1600
Also, how to remove this from popping up in the bottom right corners of my desktop?
[URL] ......
Also, how do I disable the being able to drag the top of my desktop down and resizes my desktop, so many times moving my icons around after they get rearranged and I accidentally change my desktop size...
So there's my start screen and as you can see, the only program that is not Windows' built-in is Skype but actually I've installed several programs. The problem is, the installed programs don't appear on the start screen, like what windows 8.0 did. They showed on the app screen. My windows is MSDN 8.1 Pro.
How to set all installed programs to appear on start screen?
3 days before my Windows 8.1 pc wasn't working during log in it showed up with "The System Event Notification Service service failed the sign in."
I posted this thread but no one replied then back yesterday I ran it into Safe Mode and used the CMD and put these "sfc/scannow" then the PC booted into Safe Mode.
But in my Start Menu many apps won't open accept Facebook, Twitter, Photos and the Store opens, and when I goto install apps it shows "This app wasn't installed"
And my Start menu is like this:
And the "sfc/scannow" command shows that there are Corrupted or Missing Files Then I also did these:
DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /ScanhealthDISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth But then also no luck .what to do I updated my PC from Windows 8 to Windows 8.1 4 days before And this happened 3 days before And the PC started to boot from yesterday.
I have a problem whit my new computer on windows 8. Today I turned on the computer, I login, but then, the start menu app's doesn't work anymore! When I wan't to open skype it doesn't work, when I click on desktop it doesn't open.. I need to click on the windows button every time.
I clicked on the windows button, then the app to go to the desktop was clickable, when I was on the desktop, the start menu doesn't appear if I go whit my mouse left under. If I go whit my mouse right, that menu also doesn't appear. Also some programs doesn't open anymore automatically..
The button for the music also doesn't work, I can't turn of the music etc..
After updating to Windows 8.1 (from windows 8), start menu stopped to hide after choosing an app. I enter menu start -> click on desired application tile (if it is metro app, everything works) -> nothing happens -> when i manually close menu (return to desktop) i see that desired program is running. It is very annoying - in Windows 8 (and 8.1 on my friends' machines) i just needed to enter menu and click on app. Menu would close automatically and app would run. Now i need to enter menu, click on app and close the menu. I've seen some examples of proper behavior but it was rare and i couldn't identify the pattern when menu is working as expected and when is not. I really don't want to reinstall whole system P.S. I also noticed that search is a little bit slower, but this may be caused by the fact, that now it searches also files by default, not just apps.
So recently I downloaded windows 8.1 onto my Asus laptop and my apps on the start menu will not work. whenever I click on them the apps blink or flash and don't open, I try clicking on them again but same thing happens the screen will blink them disappear again.
I'm trying to delete the games listed here in my start menu programs list:
I've read online that you should be able to delete them by going into the program files folder for "Wildtangent games" but the problem is that I ACCIDENTALLY DELETED THAT FOLDER PERMANENTLY, so now when I click on "open file location" I get this games window that I cant do anything with:
I already tried re-installing wildtangent games to see if that would somehow re-instate access to these games' files in program files, but to no avail.
Is there still some way to make it so they dont show up?
I can't seem to find where you can increase the size of the fonts used within the tiles on the start menu in 8.1. Is it possible to do, and if so, where would I do it at?
Metro Apps/Tiles Keep Refreshing To Default Settings?
I consider myself an advanced user, but I still overlook a lot of things and make mistakes like everyone.
Basically, Windows 8.1's Metro apps and tiles keep refreshing to default settings like it's the first time I've used them or opened them.
When I go to use Skype, it will always ask if it is allowed to use my webcam and microphone. It seems to remember the settings for a while, then forgets them.
I'm assuming this is CCleaner related, but I unchecked all of the settings that correspond to the Metro applications, and this changes nothing.
I'm unsure if I am actually deleting important information Windows needs without knowing. I usually delete logs on top of the usual things to keep my computer clean.
I just did a fresh install of 8.1 pro on my computer with an SSD. When i click the start button and use the apps window(not metro) to launch desktop programs they load extremely slow. The start menu doesn't even close on its own when i click to launch a program either i have to manually close it then a few seconds later the program will launch. When i open the program from explorer it loads instantly but for whatever reason doing anything through the new start menu is extremely slow.
I recently purchased a game from the Windows Store. It said it was installed. I went to the start screen to find it and it is not there. I did a search and it does not show up. I went back to the store to re-install it but it says I own the app, how I can sort this out. I am running Windows 8.1 Preview.
I'm using start8 and dual monitor setup in extended mode. Is there a way to keep the metro start menu up on 2nd monitor while have a browser or another program open on the 1st monitor.
I've recently purchased a new laptop with Windows 8.1 pre-installed. First question is how do i enable a confirm window to pop up when deleting something? I don't like how i can just hit delete and it moves it (Only to the recycle bin, but i'd rather it didn't).
Secondly how do i stop the start menu from switching to that Windows 8 menu view? I did originally change it so that when you click the start menu (Bottom left in) it would actually bring up the start menu, but it seems to have reverted. On top of this how do i change it so that pressing the Windows button brings up the start menu rather than the Windows 8 menu view thing?
Thirdly how do i enable file details when in Windows Explorer. So in Windows 7 when you select a file it would give the size, name, author, date last edited etc in the details pane. How do i get that now?
Finally, how do i change my task bars transparency?
When you launch skype from the startmenu it is a huge square, when i launch task manager from the startmenu it is launched to the desktop.
Could there be a way to make the task menu launch from the startmenu to be a big square like skype is "phone eddition"
This would be useful because when im in games and the game freezes, i can bring up the start menu like SUPER FAST and it is visible but when i launch the task manager it is behind the game no matter what, so im always pressing the key stroke of the first letter of the game and pressing delete to see if i closed the game or not.
I actually have no problem with the Win 8.1 Start menu, but the colors of the regular desktop environment are killing me. Namely, the weird, off-off white of the menus. The High-Contrast White option under Personalization gives me the right color for the menu backgrounds but everything else about the theme screams windows 3.1, so I'd rather not resort to using that.
Is there maybe a registry tweak that I can use to change this one little color? I've tried a few things but nothing so far has worked.
I am unable to pin to start any shortcuts from explorer. I've tried changing the local group policy Remove pinned programs list from the Start Menu to disable and it still doesn't work .
When clicking on the down arrow to add existing shortcuts i can. But i have other programs I wish to pin that aren't listed in there. Looking for restoring the ability to pin programs to the start menu .
How To create a start button shortcut to get to start menu in the taskbar. So that we don't need to click the invisible place in the taskbar And there would be a button on which we will click to go to the metro ui start menu.
If we will click on the start button Then We can get The Start Screen. Is there any way to create it??
For more than a week now, the above situation have been occurring. I have "scoured" the web and tried a lot of "solutions" and none as at yet have normalized my situation.
I am suspecting that I might need a registry solution, since I cannot refresh my installation- I upgraded to win 8 from win 7 online.
Also, the Skype app crashes almost as soon as it finishes loading and returns to the start menu. But, there is a sign it is still running and whenever you click on it, it trips off again.
I have uninstalled and re-installed several times, ran the apps troubleshooters many times, checked that the time service is running, synchronized this and that, etc to no avail.
My Mail Live tile do not have the option to turn on/off live update but the Calendar and People tiles have it yet none is updating.