thank you so much. this information was very useful. Problem solved! 🙂
Martin
9 years ago
What if I accidentally permanently deleted one of them, how can i get it back?
Jay Consolver
9 years ago
I tend to delete these files, mostly because I am obsessive about the ways things look. I have not noticed any changes on my desktop or any place else – so far.
John
9 years ago
Running Windows 8.1 here, I never changed any of the display files settings. All of I sudden I notice the two desktop.ini files.
The only thing i did from the time the desktop.ini files weren’t there and when they showed up is I connected two external usb drives and I also played a video, which I did by clicking “Open with” and then selecting media player since that was not the default player.
Weird, somehow one of those actions caused the settings to change so that it displays the hidden system files.
I, too, am running Windows 8.1 and all of a sudden noticed the two desktop.ini files today.
They didn’t show up immediately after connecting two external usb drives (although I did do that two days ago). Not sure whether I did what you did (choosing another media player for a video), though.
Very weird!
I’m going to try to find out how to hide them in Windows 8.1 now…
Same thing happened with me. It was too easy. The steps listed above worked & the icons disappeared from my desktop. I’m also running Windows 8.1. Just go to Control Panel, then click “folder options”….uncheck “display system files & folders”. Or you can click at the bottom to restore settings to their defaults [which is what I did] & the .ini files vanished from my desktop (there were 3 displayed on my computer.) This spontaneously occurred for me as well as I’d not adjusted anything & they’d never been there before.
Rajni
9 years ago
Some .ini files are hidden and they are grayed out. Some are not grayed out. What does it mean? Can I keep all .ini files in one folders?
Tim
9 years ago
Same thing happened here. Never saw these before until today, and suddenly there are two desktop.ini files on my desktop (Windows 7). Could this have been the result of a Windows update or something? Virus?
Murthy V
9 years ago
This problem is resolved clearly step by step.. good work keep it up..
jacob
8 years ago
Omg thank sooooo much fix my prob
Oscar
8 years ago
Hi, this website is very useful. Actually I deleted the files first and then I searched for “desktop.ini files” because I thought I had done the wrong thing. The information is very clear and to the point, now I am not concerned anymore. Thanks!
Thanks very helpful,
what i did was go to control panel then opened folders options and restore settings to defaults and the desktop.ini icons were gone.
Tdog
8 years ago
GreAT info! It was bugging me lol Not on the desktop anymore 😉 Thank Youuuuuu
Eliel Tacagam
8 years ago
i noticed that another desktop.ini files appear after deleting the previous ones. then i tried to restore the ones which i deleted. however, there is a warning saying that there will be a problem in the folders where it belongs to if i restore it. scary! can i totally delete the ones in the recycle bin? can it affect my PC? how? thank you so much!
Judy
8 years ago
I have a folder on my desktop marked “Download Games”. All of a sudden today while I was on Pandora, my screen flickered, turned totally black, and one of the games out of that folder started to play….ALL BY ITSELF! It has been doing that all day. This is sooo weird? I turned my computer off, thinking that would solve the problem. No luck. Do you have any idea what is causing this problem? Sure hope it can be fixed. I was thinking about uninstalling all of my games, then reinstall them.
Zachariah
8 years ago
Thanks.. I had 2 desktop.ini files on my desktop. I checked “don’t show hidden files” from folder options in control panel. Now they
are gone..
Prof. Jewell
8 years ago
Better for me if there were some way to move both of them off the desktop to some other location without changing the other files I often desire to view.
Novice
8 years ago
Thanks! But does it exist in laptops as well?
cmar
8 years ago
thank you for posting this.
Prasad
8 years ago
Really informative.
noel
8 years ago
thanks for clearing up the problem ,window 10 user.. buged me for days
Linda FMC
8 years ago
Thank You sooo much for the EASY solution to removing the two desktop.ini icons on my screen. Just clicking to “hide” them worked perfectly and very quickly. I can’t tell you how much I appreciated your solution.
Anthony
8 years ago
Great article, lots of detail and best of all, my desktop.ini folders are gone
Nilou
7 years ago
the information was very helpful.
i have question thought; i did not change the setting to show the hidden and protected files but it suddenly started showing them! why did that happen? is my computer defected by malwares?
Phyllis Moore
7 years ago
That was, as is all your writing, succinct, well written, and on my level of understanding. Fabulous!!
Thank you.
Anil
7 years ago
Thanks for your information…Problem solved…
Anonymous
7 years ago
Great article. Problem solved. Thank you.
Hasan
7 years ago
I have only one desktop.ini file on my laptop screen. I delete it once a while, but it is back a while later.
myinthtwe
7 years ago
I like to remove desktop.ini.may you help me?how to solve’access is denied’
aditya
6 years ago
I hid them.
Indranarayan Bishi
6 years ago
Set don’t show hidden files ,folder and drives in file and folder option .
It works.
Max
6 years ago
I suddenly found these two icons on my desktop. Now in a folder of photos of my grandson I cannot open any of them. There are words below the various files in desktop.ini that say combo 1 combo 14 combo 22, etc. What is that and how do I get the photos? This seems to be the only one that has been impacted by this recently.
Jim Kulnane
6 years ago
I followed the directions and hid them. I don’t know why they showed up in the first place. Thank you for the information.
Terry Shackelford
6 years ago
I hid them.
lol
6 years ago
at first i thought it was a virus XD
Sagar
6 years ago
i can’t find the folder in the represented location in windows 10 and any i found it in the search bar below and it’s working i hidden my transparent files!
Augustine Musariri
6 years ago
The explanation was very helpful.
I have hidden the files
Laurie Whittaker
6 years ago
These file should appear on file manager, but not on my desktop
Thank you for the information, it was really very informative. I was not getting what to do with this files, i was actually thinking of deleting these files.
Once again thanks a lot for the information and explanatory discussion.
Jim C
6 years ago
This is a a very well written and clear article – very helpful. Thank you.
I deleted the new (second) Ddesktop.ini icon on my computer, and the action crashed my computer completely.–operating system, and all files.
I had to go to a nearby computer repair store and have everything reinstalled, However, I lost hundreds of files that could not be recovered. So, how can this be? There was no “are you sure you want to do this?” prompt either, nor any “do not delete” warning–just disaster.
Andres Jimenez
5 years ago
Great article! thanks a lot for the explanation. helped me resolve my matter. good advised.
Hans
5 years ago
Today suddenly a third desktop.ini appeared! This is realy confusing me.. is there even a third (maybe hidden) desktop somewhere? Please help.
It is the third one from OneDriveDesktop. For example you can have there icons which you want when you access your account from different device. I hate this setup! Multiple locations for desktop, pictures and documents. I see there is no rule. Some applications create in C:UsersQwertFixyDocuments some on OneDrive. It is confusing like h***
Amena
4 years ago
Thank you for this helpful guide/ article.. I prefer to hide the configuration and protected files, and that what I did.
thank you so much. this information was very useful. Problem solved! 🙂
What if I accidentally permanently deleted one of them, how can i get it back?
I tend to delete these files, mostly because I am obsessive about the ways things look. I have not noticed any changes on my desktop or any place else – so far.
Running Windows 8.1 here, I never changed any of the display files settings. All of I sudden I notice the two desktop.ini files.
The only thing i did from the time the desktop.ini files weren’t there and when they showed up is I connected two external usb drives and I also played a video, which I did by clicking “Open with” and then selecting media player since that was not the default player.
Weird, somehow one of those actions caused the settings to change so that it displays the hidden system files.
I, too, am running Windows 8.1 and all of a sudden noticed the two desktop.ini files today.
They didn’t show up immediately after connecting two external usb drives (although I did do that two days ago). Not sure whether I did what you did (choosing another media player for a video), though.
Very weird!
I’m going to try to find out how to hide them in Windows 8.1 now…
Same thing happened with me. It was too easy. The steps listed above worked & the icons disappeared from my desktop. I’m also running Windows 8.1. Just go to Control Panel, then click “folder options”….uncheck “display system files & folders”. Or you can click at the bottom to restore settings to their defaults [which is what I did] & the .ini files vanished from my desktop (there were 3 displayed on my computer.) This spontaneously occurred for me as well as I’d not adjusted anything & they’d never been there before.
Some .ini files are hidden and they are grayed out. Some are not grayed out. What does it mean? Can I keep all .ini files in one folders?
Same thing happened here. Never saw these before until today, and suddenly there are two desktop.ini files on my desktop (Windows 7). Could this have been the result of a Windows update or something? Virus?
This problem is resolved clearly step by step.. good work keep it up..
Omg thank sooooo much fix my prob
Hi, this website is very useful. Actually I deleted the files first and then I searched for “desktop.ini files” because I thought I had done the wrong thing. The information is very clear and to the point, now I am not concerned anymore. Thanks!
i deleted them from desktop and hided remaining….
Hided is not a word.
And you can’t say “from desktop”
Thats exactly what I did.
Thanks very helpful,
what i did was go to control panel then opened folders options and restore settings to defaults and the desktop.ini icons were gone.
GreAT info! It was bugging me lol Not on the desktop anymore 😉 Thank Youuuuuu
i noticed that another desktop.ini files appear after deleting the previous ones. then i tried to restore the ones which i deleted. however, there is a warning saying that there will be a problem in the folders where it belongs to if i restore it. scary! can i totally delete the ones in the recycle bin? can it affect my PC? how? thank you so much!
I have a folder on my desktop marked “Download Games”. All of a sudden today while I was on Pandora, my screen flickered, turned totally black, and one of the games out of that folder started to play….ALL BY ITSELF! It has been doing that all day. This is sooo weird? I turned my computer off, thinking that would solve the problem. No luck. Do you have any idea what is causing this problem? Sure hope it can be fixed. I was thinking about uninstalling all of my games, then reinstall them.
Thanks.. I had 2 desktop.ini files on my desktop. I checked “don’t show hidden files” from folder options in control panel. Now they
are gone..
Better for me if there were some way to move both of them off the desktop to some other location without changing the other files I often desire to view.
Thanks! But does it exist in laptops as well?
thank you for posting this.
Really informative.
thanks for clearing up the problem ,window 10 user.. buged me for days
Thank You sooo much for the EASY solution to removing the two desktop.ini icons on my screen. Just clicking to “hide” them worked perfectly and very quickly. I can’t tell you how much I appreciated your solution.
Great article, lots of detail and best of all, my desktop.ini folders are gone
the information was very helpful.
i have question thought; i did not change the setting to show the hidden and protected files but it suddenly started showing them! why did that happen? is my computer defected by malwares?
That was, as is all your writing, succinct, well written, and on my level of understanding. Fabulous!!
Thank you.
Thanks for your information…Problem solved…
Great article. Problem solved. Thank you.
I have only one desktop.ini file on my laptop screen. I delete it once a while, but it is back a while later.
I like to remove desktop.ini.may you help me?how to solve’access is denied’
I hid them.
Set don’t show hidden files ,folder and drives in file and folder option .
It works.
I suddenly found these two icons on my desktop. Now in a folder of photos of my grandson I cannot open any of them. There are words below the various files in desktop.ini that say combo 1 combo 14 combo 22, etc. What is that and how do I get the photos? This seems to be the only one that has been impacted by this recently.
I followed the directions and hid them. I don’t know why they showed up in the first place. Thank you for the information.
I hid them.
at first i thought it was a virus XD
i can’t find the folder in the represented location in windows 10 and any i found it in the search bar below and it’s working i hidden my transparent files!
The explanation was very helpful.
I have hidden the files
These file should appear on file manager, but not on my desktop
I agree
Thank you for the information, it was really very informative. I was not getting what to do with this files, i was actually thinking of deleting these files.
Once again thanks a lot for the information and explanatory discussion.
This is a a very well written and clear article – very helpful. Thank you.
You are welcome. Happy to help.
I chose to not delete them, and followed your instructions on how to hide these two icons. Thanks for the info.
Great article, thanks! I left my desktop.ini files alone.
I put the desktop ini files in the waste paper basket. Always a nuicance and look sinister. Some hackers might use them to spy on my computer.
I chose to hide them
I have seen mostly 20 desktop.ini at the same file and there is desktop.ini nearly at every file, not only desktop
Thank you so much!!! This article is a dream. That icon has been haunting me for years now. I like a clean desktop.
Thanks!
I deleted the new (second) Ddesktop.ini icon on my computer, and the action crashed my computer completely.–operating system, and all files.
I had to go to a nearby computer repair store and have everything reinstalled, However, I lost hundreds of files that could not be recovered. So, how can this be? There was no “are you sure you want to do this?” prompt either, nor any “do not delete” warning–just disaster.
Great article! thanks a lot for the explanation. helped me resolve my matter. good advised.
Today suddenly a third desktop.ini appeared! This is realy confusing me.. is there even a third (maybe hidden) desktop somewhere? Please help.
It is the third one from OneDriveDesktop. For example you can have there icons which you want when you access your account from different device. I hate this setup! Multiple locations for desktop, pictures and documents. I see there is no rule. Some applications create in C:UsersQwertFixyDocuments some on OneDrive. It is confusing like h***
Thank you for this helpful guide/ article.. I prefer to hide the configuration and protected files, and that what I did.