Windows 7 desktop crashed: what should I do? Restoring the system in 30 minutes

Usually, shortcuts appear after a short delay. But sometimes, even after a while, on the screen there is nothing but a splash screen. Why did the Windows 7 desktop go missing? What to do? Let's try to identify and solve the problem.

Icons disabled

In all new OS versions, personalization settings allow you to completely disable the display of shortcuts. If you use a computer not only you, there is a possibility that someone accidentally did it. This is the simplest and least harmless reason that explains why the desktop of WIndows disappeared. 7. What should I do?

Right click anywhere on the screen. Find the "View" tab in the context menu. Make sure that the shortcuts are displayed - a tick near the corresponding item should be checked.

Labels have been marked as hidden

It's almost impossible to do it by accident, so in this case, you, most likely, someone decided to play a trick. Icons and folders marked as hidden are still in place, but they are not displayed by default. If you lost your desktop, shortcuts and icons in Windows 7 for this very reason, you first need to enable the display of hidden items. To do this, go to the "Control Panel" and open the "Folder Options". In the list on the "View" tab it is necessary to scroll through the list of parameters and enable the display of hidden files and folders (a checkmark next to the corresponding item). If labels have appeared, it remains only to remove the attribute "hidden" in the properties.

The system moved the items to the "Unused Shortcuts" folder

This is another possible reason, explaining why the desktop went missing. Windows 7 can perform automatic cleaning of the desktop and with a certain periodicity remove from the workspace those icons that you do not use.

By default, the folder "Unused shortcuts" should be displayed on the desktop (if not - you can search through the search). If this is your case, it will be enough just to transfer the required labels back. After that, you should turn off the cleaning. To do this, open the properties of the screen, find the "Desktop" tab and click "Settings ...". You just need to clear the checkbox next to "Perform cleaning every 60 days" and save the changes. Although the advice to check "Trash" many seem stupid, we recommend doing this. In practice, it often happens that the labels were banal removed.

The file explorer.exe was missing

Now let's talk about more complex variants, when it becomes unclear why the desktop of Windows 7 disappeared. What should I do if the above tips did not help? Most likely, when the system boots, explorer.exe, the process responsible for the external display of the system, does not start. To check this, go to "Task Manager"> "Processes" (Ctrl + Shift + Del) and try to find explorer. Sometimes when you try to open the dispatcher, nothing happens. In this case, start Windows in safe mode by pressing F8 at boot time, and try again.

In the manager menu, select "File", click "New task" and in the window that appears, enter the command cmd. In the opened window, you need to register the path to the file (by default it lies in the Windows folder located on the C: drive). If the shortcuts appear after that, then the file is on the computer, and you just need to fix several registry errors.

What if I do not have explorer.exe on my computer and can not start it? In this case, you will need an installation disk for your "Windows".

1. Open the drive from another PC and locate the file explorer.ex_ in the i386 directory.
2. Copy it to any place, and then change the extension to .EXE (just rename it).
3. Write the finished file on the USB flash drive and connect it to your computer.
4. Run the cmd command line via the Task Manager.
5. Navigate to the files on the USB flash drive. To do this, enter the disc name (E :, D: or other).
6. Copy the file to the system folder using the copy explorer.exe command C: \\ Windows. If everything is done correctly, a message will be displayed that the operation is successful.
7. Restart the PC.

If there is no installation disk, you can copy explorer.exe from another computer to Windows 7.

Explorer.exe Disappeared from the Registry

Let's talk in more detail about what to do if the Windows 7 desktop vanishes due to registry errors. In this case, when you start the process through the "Task Manager" shortcuts appear, but after restarting the computer disappear again. This means that the registry does not correctly set the conditions for running explorer.exe. Run the Run application and type regedit. The Registry Editor opens. You need to find the following directory:

In the Shell line, explorer.exe should be written. If instead of this some other file is registered, or nothing at all, change the value of the parameter. Are you ready? Go ahead. Now we need to open another folder from the same directory.

If there is an item explorer.exe (or iexplorer.exe), you need to delete it, and then restart the PC. If the icons are still not displayed, the file is likely to be corrupted and must be replaced.

System settings failed

Sometimes even after adding a file to the registry, the problem persists. This may indicate a failure in the system settings. Fortunately, the "seven" has a special application - "System Restore", which returns the computer to an earlier state. You can start it with the same program "Run". To do this, enter the command shown in the screenshot below.

Next, following the prompts, select the date to which you want to do a "rollback", and run the program. The main thing is to specify the time when the system was 100% working fine.

The computer was infected with viruses

The trivial option is when exactly because of the malware you lost the desktop of Windows 7. What to do in this case, you probably know. To open the antivirus, you can enter the full address of its executable file in the Run window (for example, C: \\ Programs \ Antivirus \ antivirus.exe). It is recommended that you scan your PC in safe mode. After checking, delete all infected files and restart the computer.

If this did not help, the best solution would be simply to reinstall Windows. You can copy the desired files to the USB flash drive via the command line (of course, if you can remember their location).