Mysterious Blue Double-Arrows Added to Windows Desktop File & Folder Icons

Brilliant. This worked for me. Thanks!

Suggestion: instead of creating or downloading a blank icon, just set the registry path for string value "179" to C:\Windows\System32\shell32.dll,49 which is a blank icon included in the native Windows icon library.

Or paste in notepad:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Icons]
"179"="C:\\Windows\\System32\\shell32.dll,49"

Save with .reg extension, double-click to run.

Brilliant. This worked for me. Thanks!

Suggestion: instead of creating or downloading a blank icon, just set the registry path for string value "179" to C:\Windows\System32\shell32.dll,49 which is a blank icon included in the native Windows icon library.

Or paste in notepad:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Icons]
"179"="C:\\Windows\\System32\\shell32.dll,49"

Save with .reg extension, double-click to run.

Thanks,

I just tried what u suggested and it seems to work on medium sized icons and smaller, but when u change Icon size to large or extra large a sort of black square shows up where the arrows are. Maybe Its on mine only, do you get the same issue as well using your method? 

Aha! I see what you mean. I enlarged the icons and got the black boxes like you described.
I then tried the blank icon in C:\Windows\System32\imageres.dll,113 (imageres.dll seems to have higher resolution icons.)

I enlarged the icons, and while the black boxes didn't appear, a faint outline of a box did, which isn't noticeable on medium icons and smaller.

I tried your blank.ico and did NOT get the same issue when enlarging the icons. So it seems your icon is the one to go with if users like large icons. Thanks for pointing it out and for your solution!

**********

Edit 12/26/15:

Well, it turns out after a reboot the blank icon was replaced with a black square, regardless of whether I used the downloaded blank.ico or the blank icon from C:\Windows\System32\imageres.dll,113, I've tried both now. The size of the icon doesn't seem to matter either.

Hi,

 

Thank you for posting your query on Microsoft Community.

I will surely help you with this.

To assist you better, do let us know if you have installed Norton Antivirus in the computer.

 

We had already seen this issue on computers with Norton Antivirus. If you have Notrton Antivirus installed on the computer then One of or forum member "lanedog33 " had found that the blue arrows are just indicators to let you know what has been backed up and what hasnt been.

To get rid of the arrows, open up Norton and go to settings. Then go to backup. There is an option that says "Backup Status Overlay". If you uncheck this option then the arrows will no longer appear. It wont make your computer more vulnerable, it just removes the arrows.

 

Do let us know the result. We will be glad to help if you need further assistance.

 

Jesus Christ... why you guys from Microsoft always make Norton "the guilt"? It's always the first question. Everybody is tired to know that it's about Microsoft incompetence. Windows 10 brought a lot of problems to our computers. First was with display driver, than with printer, than with Cortana, than with PDF files on Edge, than with Microsoft Store, than with Internet Explorer 11 (have been murderer slowly) and now that arrows. And the guilt is Norton!

There is no integration between Outlook and Skype (as WLMail and WLMessenger used to have), you need to add the same person twice to be able to interact with he/she by email and chat. OneDrive doesn't allow you address to a group, you need to fill the To field with every single email address you want to send to. Outlook desktop still has New Groups grey out so you can't use it and a Moderator here wrote that it's not relevant. And the guilt is Norton!

In my opinion, Microsoft should bring Symantec to the court and solve all these problems above.