Solved Windows 11 pro desktop icons

just setting up a new windows 11 pro laptop, I have dragged and dropped a few files from backup usb to my desktop and I noticed that two of the files have little red X's in the bottom left corner, files open as normal so what do these red X's mean please? all help and advice appreciated

conrail said:

just setting up a new windows 11 pro laptop, I have dragged and dropped a few files from backup usb to my desktop and I noticed that two of the files have little red X's in the bottom left corner, files open as normal so what do these red X's mean please? all help and advice appreciated

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Right click on desktop and choose refresh. Failing that reset the icon cache by deleting C:\Users\(User Name)\AppData\Local\IconCache.db.
You will need to show hidden files in Control Panel -> File Explorer Options - View Tab to see that folder (if you want to).

You can delete the icon cache by running these commands in order in Windows Terminal......

ie4uinit.exe -show
taskkill /IM explorer.exe /F
DEL /A /Q "%localappdata%\IconCache.db"
DEL /A /F /Q "%localappdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer\iconcache*"
shutdown /r /f /t 00

And the following is a tutorial on that and two other ways to do it.....

conrail said:

....two of the files have little red X's in the bottom left corner, files open as normal so what do these red X's mean please?

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That is a OneDrive sync indicator.

A red circle with a white cross means that a file or folder cannot be synced. You'll see this in File Explorer or on the OneDrive notification area icons.

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Welcome to the forum. These days, documents, pictures, and desktop folders are stored in onedrive by default...not on your hard drive as you have been accustomed to. However, there is a way to move the folders back to your user folder residing on your computer if you prefer.
See instructions in post #2 in this thread. How to get a folder out of your OneDrive

thank you secondsight, Bree and glasskuter, I appreciate your help and advice, all sorted

glasskuter said:

These days, documents, pictures, and desktop folders are stored in onedrive by default...not on your hard drive as you have been accustomed to.

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Yes and no. It is uploaded to one drive (space available) and the data is on the computer as well by default.

Bree said:

That is a OneDrive sync indicator.

What do the OneDrive icons mean? - Microsoft Support

support.microsoft.com

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In the picture supplied the red x is on the bottom left not on the bottom right. I thought sync issues were when the red x was on the bottom right of the icon only.

thank you one and all, much appreciated