Missing taskbar icons

[auutumn]

This morning my PC had several icons in the taskbar (where the clock is) and the Show/Hide arrow was visible. This evening, 18 Microsoft updates were downloaded and installed. When I rebooted, no icons or arrow were displayed. I rebooted again but no luck.

I started my browser (Avant) and minimized it, which usually goes to the taskbar but it wasn't displayed. I started the browser again and the browser that was already running was displayed, which is good.

Has anyone else had this issue and know how to correct it?

 

[gavinseabrook]

Never seen this issue, but you might want to go to Start>Run and type MSCONFIG. Check the startup items, make sure they are all turned on. That or go to Start>Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Event viewer and check for any errors in the "System" field. Report back with your findings.

 

[Rick]

Here's some info on a simliar problem:
http://www.mydigitallife.info/2006/01/04/system-tray-icon-missing-from-system-tray-in-windows-xp/

 

[auutumn]

Never seen this issue, but you might want to go to Start>Run and type MSCONFIG. Check the startup items, make sure they are all turned on. That or go to Start>Control Panel>Administrative Tools>Event viewer and check for any errors in the "System" field. Report back with your findings.

I've tried serveral things like you suggestion and others have in other posts but still nothing. I did notice that when I do the following steps, the Hide Inactive icons option is disabled.

- right-click the Taskbar
- select Properties
- clear the check box Hide inactive icons

 

[gavinseabrook]

What OS are you running? Home/professional and do you have all of your windows updates?

 

[auutumn]

I have the Home version. I decided to restore my system to before the updates. I then installed the MS updates in groups and never got the issue again.

 

[DScoffers]

I've found this fix, which seemed to work for me on XP Pro.
In regedit, go to HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Policies/Explorer

Delete NoTrayItemsDisplay and re-create it as a DWORD value with a decimal value of 0. (If it's already a DWORD, just edit it)

Hope this helps.