Shortcut arrows replaced with padlock. Can't fix.

[Mugsy]

On my desktop, most (but not all) of the "arrows" on my shortcuts have been replaced with a padlock icon and I can't change them back (yes, I tried fixing the Registry entry.) I have no idea what's different about the shortcuts that weren't affected, and NEW shortcuts don't have this problem.

Here's what happened:

I tried the "Windows 10" upgrade, found it didn't support some of my hardware, so I rolled it back to "Windows 7".

Everything is back to normal with one exception: All of the arrows on my desktop shortcuts have been replaced with the "locked" (Padlock) icon. As far as I can tell, the files they point to aren't locked. I can edit/delete/rename the target files as usual. Security says I have Full Permission.

I've tried the old "Vista Shortcut Manager", but it has no effect. It creates/changes the following Registry entry:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Shell Icons\29

Which points to an arrow.ico overlay that comes with VSM. I've tried changing the registry entry to one of the Shell icons, but the change was ignored.

I have no saved Restore Points to go back to. A Registry scan finds no problems.

Does anyone know of a fix (beyond recreating every single shortcut?) We're talking hundreds. Thx.

 

[Mugsy]

Never found a fix. Just ended up restoring Windows from an old backup.

If anyone knows what happened though, I'd be interested in hearing it.