[SOLVED] Custom File Icons isn't working in Windows 8

[stoik]

Fwcetus, thanks ...

I tried Irfan View, but that didn't work on my Windows 8 (64-bit) machine.

[LordLiverpool]

I don't know about Windows 7, but I solved this in Windows 10 without changing the associated program. In Win10, the user's chosen icon editing program is stored under:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.ico\UserChoice

Look at ProgID and you'll see something like this:

Applications\IcoFX.exe

Go and find that key under HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT. Now what you need to do is create a DefaultIcon under that key, for example:

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications\IcoFX.exe\DefaultIcon

and set its value to:

%1

That tells Windows that the icon for files associated with this applications are the files themselves (they are their own icon).

In Windows 7 the UserChoice key may not exist, but there are definitely multiple levels of file associations in the registry (it's a mess). You may need to hunt down exactly what key is responsible for the file type's behaviour.

[admin]

Welcome to the club,

and thanks for the tip!

Don

[aubrey97]

In case it helps anyone else:

I have been having a problem in Windows 10 with
a) Custom file icons not showing up
b) File icons on my toolbar tools not showing up

Eventually I did as suggested earlier in this thread - I just changed the default association for .ico files in Windows to another random program (to paint as it happens) and the custom icons in XYPlorer and my toolbar icons were all restored. Simple to do -- in Windows file explorer find a .ico file, right click "Open with" check box to always use this file, and open with some other (installed - i.e. non portable) software.

[Dustydog]

I'm on Win10.

I don't know how broadly this applies to, well, any system but mine at this point :S, or even if this is particularly the right thread, or applicable, but I do think it's interesting that I can't get a unique preview for an icon (rather than a standard one for the icon editor I'm using at the moment), if the icon file has an embedded image that's 256 pixels. I can create the icon with as many sub images in whatever bit-depth I want - as long as there's nothing as large as 256.

I haven't done extensive testing yet on my custom icons. I do know I can't override one that's both my system default and a top custom file association. I would think the intent is that the custom icon overrides both. (This was for Acrobat files. I've got Sumatra as my default at the moment and tried to set an Adobe-style custom from both the executable and an ico file. Nope. But the Sumatra icon was an improvement over the Win Photos icon.)

it's been interesting reading in several of the posts to hear how people have gotten Win 8/10 to cooperate with even showing the blasted things properly, and it has improved how things are working on my system. I also think it's interesting that I've never had trouble with my toolbar icons.

It's the sort of thing, though, where I'm just getting tired of trying to get things to work that aren't a high priority. Some other time.

I hope this helps if anyone wants to view an icon collection better inside XY. Some tools I've found useful are XNView classic, with shell extension, and Greenfish Icon Editor. XNView was, of course, happy to preview anything very nicely. Windows only cooperated after some effort. The Shell Extension with XnView was handy for quick viewing, and for turning an .ico back into a .png which I could then turn back into a smaller ico file quickly. *shrug*

Hope the testing helps someone. I suppose the older versions of Win never had a need for large icons, though 256 pixel icons with the metro interface are potentially useful currently.