Change Windows 8.1 Desktop Taskbar Behavior
Jun 10, 2014
I have my installation of Windows 8.1 desktop taskbar set to never combine, use small icons and locked. With XP I could pin a program to the taskbar, click it once and the program would open. Click the program icon a second time and a new instance of the program would open. With Win 8.1 if you click the icon the second time the window simply minimizes. How can I restore the old XP behavior. I realize that I can right-click on the icon after one instance is open and open another instance of the program. However, that is an additional step that is a pain in the butt.
I should add that I use the latest version of Classic Shell and have look through the settings and don't see any that can change this behavior.
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Sep 8, 2013
(At least the Recycle Bin can be removed without a registry edit hack. These have always been my top 2 peeves of Windows.)
From the desktop view I simply want to look down and to the right to see the "Sunday, September 8, 2013 - 2:17PM" I see now ... but have to move my mouse over there and hover over it first. Why would I want to have to do that?
It wasn't possible in XP (that I know of) not without having to expand your taskbar to twice the width. (And let's face it, there is nothing quite as intimidating as a big huge fat thick taskbar.)
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Jan 14, 2013
I know how to manage the behavior of icons and notifications in Windows 8, but how do I delete programs from the list of icons and notifications (that appear on the taskbar)?
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Jan 1, 2013
In other verisons of windows the tiles on the taskbar would be in order from time. If i opened Google Chrome, and then Adobe, and then another Google Chrome instance it would look that way. Now however it "groups" the two Google Chrome ones near other, and the Adobe one on the left. Anyway to change that?
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Nov 2, 2013
Just cannot figure out how to do this. I want to access mail easily from the desktop taskbar in Win 8.1.
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Aug 11, 2014
I've had a Windows 8.1 laptop (Acer) for a couple of months now. As of yesterday it's started to become unresponsive after an undefined period (say, 10 minutes) of unuse. So, when I turn on the computer, everything works fine. After I've left it alone for a while, I come back to it and find that the taskbar, desktop, and all windows buttons (minimize, maximize, close) have become unclickable, though other things (e.g. the tabs in Firefox) are still clickable. If I shut the computer down and restart it it's ok again, until it happens again.
This started yesterday: I hadn't installed any new programs yesterday.
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Sep 15, 2014
I have a 17" 1920x1080 monitor, and everything was too small, so I've change the display size to 125%, by default it was on 100% , and now some icons on the taskbar are blurry.
I don't want to change the display size to 100%, I just wanna make the icon sizes smaller. Is there any solution?
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Mar 20, 2014
I get this when trying to change the taskbar/window color in the personalize thing. turning on the Themes service does not work. using msconfig does not work.
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Sep 15, 2014
My task bar on the desk top in Windows 8.1 has suddenly increased in size and now covers one third of the screen. How can I reduce this back to the single line.
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Sep 26, 2012
This is how I have come to best like displaying the Applications folder I keep on my Windows8 Desktop Taskbar. Listed in alphabetical order it's how I can pull or access anything I may want @ any given moment w/out leaving Desktop to look for something. I simply scroll up & down for the desired item & it saves changing screens to go get something. A few, like Weather, Calendar, News I'll usually keep sitting on the APP Bar @ the top-left of the Desktop.
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Nov 11, 2013
I was trying to change the color of the taskbar and this is what I found.
I dont know how to take back the normal window that it supposed to be shown.
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Mar 3, 2013
Windows 8. All I want to do is pin a desktop icon to the taskbar. I've gone to every app on this pc, right clicked, left clicked, middle finger clicked, nose clicked, no luck.
Don't want to over simplify, but wouldn't it be great if one of those computer guru's had thought of this instruction?
"To put a desktop short cut on the task bar, right click on desktop and select pin to taskbar" or "just drag that huge desktop icon in windows to the taskbar"?
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Feb 2, 2013
For some reason when I started up my laptop recently, all of the icons on both the taskbar and the desktop have turned invisible/disappear completely and I am unaware has to how to fix it. I have put a picture in the attachments that shows what the "icons" look like when they are highlighted and non-highlighted.
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May 2, 2014
Is there a way to put an icon for the desktop in the taskbar? I just want to get to my desktop easily with one click.
The only way I know to do it now with one click is to left-click in the extreme lower right corner of my screen. The only problem with that is that the area I have to click in is so small that I'm always getting the clock. I can't do it quickly.
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Nov 13, 2012
I used to have a desktop shortcut on the taskbar so necessary for getting back there without wading through tons of open apps..
Now I cannot put a desktop shortcut on the taskbar have been trying and failing.
If I go to the start tile board and click desktop I just get back to the top open app and then have to minimise and minimise to get the desktop.
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Feb 9, 2014
Every 5 minuets or so my desktop goes completely blank, i loose icons, background, task-bar, (time, date, keyboard input selection) only thing that stays is the far right icons that stay (battery, internet connection, volume)
What causes this or why it occurs .....
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Jul 20, 2014
How do you move apps from taskbar to desktop.
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Feb 5, 2014
I was unpinning many apps from my start screen. Now when I try to run an app (such as Computer, or Control Panel) it creates an entry on the desktop taskbar, but not on the desktop.
I can't run anything on this Windows 8.0 desktop, except for IE. The only thing I can do with the taskbar icon is close the window.
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Feb 24, 2013
Has to pin media player to the taskbar or a desktop shortcut, pref in libary mode so i can play my music easier.
[not got media centre just the media player in Windows 8 home that came preinstalled.]
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Feb 7, 2014
I need to go into Program Files(x86)>Mozilla Firefox and click on the firefox logo in that folder for the Firefox page to appear.
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Dec 23, 2013
Windows 8.1
I have installed Classic Shell in an attempt to eradicate as much of Windows 8 as possible. I managed to get the word "Desktop" onto the right side of the quick launch taskbar. I have to click on a tiny arrow next to that word. That brings up a desktop menu but doesn't go to the desktop itself.
How can I get a desktop icon (not the word "Desktop") on the left side of the taskbar next to the start button? In Windows 7 the icon was on the right side but I somehow managed to move it to the left side.
I know about Win D and Win M. Those are okay but I'd rather have an icon to click on to eliminate extra keystrokes.
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Jul 9, 2013
At the bottom of my desktop/screen, I can see a thin line of the top of the taskbar. I have the taskbar on auto-hide, but tried it locked, unlocked, hidden, etc.
I tried different resolutions, restarts, images, and moving it. (It does it on all sides of the screen.)
I tried detect and identify in the resolution feature.
I did have this problem before and can't remember what I did to solve it. It turned out to be simple, but I just can't get it this time.
(The thin blue line at the bottom of the image, not the big white vertical bar.)
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Jan 6, 2013
I quite often place files on my Windows 8 desktop while im working on various stuff and have a problem with icons I cant fix, for example: I have a number of PDF files currently on my desktop and my pdf program is foxit. I DONT WANT TO CHANGE THE PROGRAM ICON, just the icons of the files it makes. I had the same issue on win7 and i know I can change folder view options to "show icons and not thumbnails" but unfortunately that screws up my image icons.
In windows 7, "types" and "nirsoft files type manager" allowed you to change the file type icon from the thumbnail to whatever icon you wanted. These 2 progs plus another I've tried don't work in win 8pro?
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Sep 15, 2014
The text under the icons on my desktop, Windows 8.1, are difficult to read. They look like they have shadows. How can I change their appearance?
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Jul 30, 2012
Where did the desktop colors applet disappear to? It's under personalize under Windows 7 but it's not there under Windows 8.
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Jul 24, 2012
The Windows 8 RTM Blog is showing some changes, one of which allows an option to boot directly to the Desktop UI.
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Mar 30, 2014
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?
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Jul 18, 2013
how to change my sign in pw on the first Desktop ?
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Aug 14, 2014
I had 8.1 installed, and did the update from 8/12/2014 and now I can't change my date and time from the desktop, it gives me the following message;
You are attempting to open a file type of 'System file' (.cpl)
These files are used by the operating system and by various programs. Modifying or editing them could damage your system.
More options
So what do I use to open and run it?
Windows 8.1 is becoming a real hassle to deal with
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Mar 7, 2014
I recently built my own PC (I5-4670K) and installed Win 8.1 64 Bit OEM Builder. Installation went fast and easy. Updated all my drivers/win updates in the past 2 hours. Windows 8.1 is activated.
When I go to Taskbar and Navigation properties -> navigation menu -> "Show my desktop background on Start " and "Search everywhere instead of just my apps when I search from the Apps view" are BOTH GRAYED OUT.
When I go to Personalization to choose images for my background nothing happens. Not even windows desktop backgrounds or anything in my picture library gets recognized.
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Sep 20, 2013
​Customising user folder icons has always been a bit tricky. All user folders apart from the desktop and contacts user folders can be changed via the customize tab in properties when the user folder is accessed from my computer (i.e. not from the desktop).
To customise the desktop and contacts user folders requires a registry change. For Windows 7 this is explained here User Folders - Change Default Icon - Windows 7 Forums, and the necessary .reg files are also provided. This method actually worked for me too in Windows 8. However, after the newest updates, the icons I had added this way have disappeared, and so has the customize tab which I had added via the .reg files available on the page mentioned above. Repeating the reg change would not make a difference. The newest updates must have changed something in the Windows 8 registry to that effect (through those updates all other user folders also lost the custom icon I had previously added, but I was able to easily restore them, as the customize tab of these user folders didn't disappear).
Hence my question: how to now change the folder icons for the desktop and contacts user folders in windows 8?
Since all my other user folders are customised in a particular style, leaving the default icon for the desktop and contacts folders looks a bit weird...
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