Comments on: Workaround to Remove Shortcut Arrow (Make Transparent) in Windows 7 Yet Can Pin to Taskbar or Start Menu

By: Twolane

Twolane — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 22:46:43 +0000

Nice. But since I can’t get it to work no matter what I do, how do I go back to the shortcut arrow in Win7? I’m really tired of the black box.

And what’s with the reference to “HKLM? Win7 uses HKEY

By: blubb

blubb — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 12:43:39 +0000

@ Angelina
lucky you doesn’t realize that if 3 out of 40 antivirus programs say it is a virus, it is nowhere near being a real virus

the best workaround to the black square is to use the .reg file and then go to regedit HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Icons and modify 29 to the path of an almost completely transparent icon, for example this icon (it contains 1 almost completely transparent pixel and several other complete transparent pixel):
http://depositfiles.com/files/441atpfqy

By: GTW

GTW — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 20:26:22 +0000

As you can see Steve, your registry hack doesn’t work. You have the wrong value placed in there somewhere. And many people here don’t want to download still another program like Ultimate Windows Tweaker V2 just to be able to do this.

By: Anton

Anton — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 06:31:06 +0000

+ you can flush icons cache by killing explorer.exe process through taskmanager and runing it again
no reboot, no FlushCode.exe

By: Anton

Anton — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 06:24:13 +0000

Dave: seems like shell32.dll,50 is a black square on my win7 too.
I made transparent icon and used it instead …\shell32.dll,50 – works fine

By: Angelina

Angelina — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 23:31:43 +0000

Are you aware of the fact that FlushCode.exe contains virus?:
http://www.virustotal.com/sv/analisis/167cc94175502b24bcfb29500707f1b59852387333fca6fce02d6293367e9a57-1257442023
Lucky me I checked it first.

By: Keith

Keith — Thu, 26 Nov 2009 23:38:51 +0000

It does not work (whether using value 50 or 52). Sometimes it works, but after reboot, all shortcut icons have a hole (empty square).

Thanks steve, Ultimate Windows Tweaker V2 is a freeware that works perfectly on this area.

By: Michael

Michael — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 05:16:22 +0000

i tried the method where you download the .reg file, (by the way im on vista home premium) but now, after i turned off my laptop, then turned it on, i realised that in the area where the arrow icon should be(the invisibe arrow thing worked until now) is a big black square! how do i undo this?????? please help i dont like having a black square on my shortcuts.

By: steve

steve — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 04:13:13 +0000

GTW: Sorry, really wasn’t trying to be rude. I just hate to see someone wait for an answer when it may have already been solved by reading down the posts.

Once again, try Ultimate Windows Tweaker V2 if you want to remove shortcut arrows or have black overlays on your icons after hacking the registry. The folks that wrote it are supposedly associated with Microsoft. All I know is it worked for me.

By: GTW

GTW — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 15:22:58 +0000

No need to be rude, steve.

Chill

By: steve

steve — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 05:51:35 +0000

For crying out loud people! Read the thread!

DOWNLOAD ULTIMATE WINDOWS TWEAKER V2.

By: Dave

Dave — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 03:45:57 +0000

why there is became a black box change by the shotcut arrow.
can you help me to fix it back?

By: Michael

Michael — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 09:48:16 +0000

Yeah works here too. ahh. the ui looks so much better!

By: GTW

GTW — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 09:42:13 +0000

Yeah well I just installed Win7 today and those shortcut arrows look retarded and hideous. It ruins an otherwise smooth, decent looking GUI.

I’ve been using Tweak UI for years on XP and Win2000 before that and so I’d really like to get rid of then. I never used Vista so I was unpleasantly surprised that M$ stopped development of Tweak UI with XP.

/:(

By: steve

steve — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 03:12:13 +0000

P.S. It fixed the pin problem for me. Just saying it worked for me. Hope it works for others.

By: steve

steve — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 03:10:18 +0000

GTW

I originally linked it but they removed it for whatever reason.
Just google “ultimate windows tweaker v2″.