[Guide] Get rid of XP's icons

[Advance]

YAY FOR NO ICONS

Start Menu^

Program Files Folder^

I would say this gets rid of about 97-99% of the icons in XP and doesn't really take that long. You will need ResHacker, Replacer, and a blank icon. Get the blank icon from the attachments located at the bottom of this post.

The two files we will be deiconing are shell32.dll and explorer.exe. This will kill most of icons you will see, of course excluding the program icons. We will be using ResHacker scripts to make life much eaiser. So first download and extract ResHacker to c:\program files\ResHacker. Do the Same to Replacer but put that in ...\Replacer.

Since we will be deleting the majority of the icons (all the ones in shell32.dll and explorer.exe, you might ask why they wont turn up as a "missing icon" icon. Well, to fix that, we are going to make things much much simpler by replacing THAT icon making it blank.

So we first want to make a back up of three files, you can use this script I made, save it to a .bat file and run it.

mkdir c:\backup000\
copy c:\windows\explorer.exe c:\backup000\
copy c:\windows\system32\shell32.dll c:\backup000\
copy c:\windows\system32\user32.dll c:\backup000\

Thats the back ups. Now to put ANOTHER copy into the ResHacker directory.

copy c:\windows\explorer.exe c:\program files\ResHacker
copy c:\windows\system32\shell32.dll c:\program files\ResHacker
copy c:\windows\system32\user32.dll c:\program files\ResHacker

Now that that is done, time to pull out the ResHacker scripts. If you are new to using the scripts I suggest you check here. Although you probaly won't need it because my awesome directions.

//Script for shell32.dll - save as shell32.txt
[FILENAMES]
Exe=shell32.dll
SaveAs=shell32
Log=shell32.log

[COMMANDS]
-delete icongroup ,,
//I HATE ICONS

There is one, save that as shell32.txt in the ResHacker directory, here is the next:

//Script for explorer.exe - save as explorer.txt
[FILENAMES]
Exe=explorer.exe
SaveAs=explorer
Log=explorer.log

[COMMANDS]
-delete icongroup ,,
//I HATE ICONS

Fairly simple no? So now you should have done the following:

Extracted ResHacker and Replacer to their folders in Program Files

-Run the back up scripts or copied them manually

-Downloaded the blank icon

-Saved the two script files to the ResHacker Directory.

Done? Good, time to run the scripts.

If you have done everything right, this wont be a problem.

Click Start and go to Run. Type in (with quotes)

"c:\program files\ResHacker\ResHacker.exe" -script "explorer.txt"

and hit enter.

Then go to run again and type

"c:\program files\ResHacker\ResHacker.exe" -script "shell32.txt"

and hit enter.

If you didin't **** it up, go to your reshacker directory and see if there are two new files named "explorer" and "shell32" If so, good, if not, you suck.. go back and figure out what you did wrong.

Delete all the log files and the scripts and the old files, you dont need them anymore. You now should only have the two new files in the RH directory.

Lets forget those for a minute and go to user32.dll

So fire up ResHacker and open user32.dll. Its in root\system32\. Replace EVERY iconGROUP there with the blank icon by expanding the tree, clicking the icon dgroup and one by one replacing it. Once you are done save it as user32 in the ResHacker directory.

Now we have all three files reshacked and in our reshacker directory, so its time to fire up replacer and start changing those ol' system files.

Disclaimer: This is the point where you should back off if you were unsure, this is when the real changed are made. I take no responsibility blah blah.

So you can drag the system files or type in the path's to them but either way, replace the file in the windows / system32 folders with their corresponding files in the ResHacker directory.

When you are done reboot! Good luck and happy computing without icons :>

Questions problems complaints to this thread or to mattalldian at gmail

icon.ico

[JustGeorge]

I fail to see why one would wish to delete all their icons, but to each his own...

[TwIzTiD_Juggalo]

if you were going for the 'minimalistic' type of thing it would go quite well i think. nice guide also (Y)

[JustGeorge]

if you were going for the 'minimalistic' type of thing it would go quite well i think.  nice guide also  (Y)

586382089[/snapback]

Yea, but damn thats just boring.

[Advance]

I happen to like it, and I am sure minimalists will too.

Opinions are like...

[John S. Veteran]

Never heard of this, but to each his own. It's more common for folks to ask how to delete the text and leave the icons. :laugh:

[Crimson Behelit]

Yea, but damn thats just boring.

586382167[/snapback]

For Christ's sake, '... but damn thats just boring.' is your personal opinion... is it unimagineable that others would find value and relative coolness in this?

[Ironman273]

For Christ's sake, '... but damn thats just boring.' is your personal opinion... is it unimagineable that others would find value and relative coolness in this?

586382318[/snapback]

...and in turn that others would find it boring? This is a message board after all.

[JustGeorge]

Sorry if I offended anyone. Not my intention.

[Inkorp]

Too much work for an anti-climactic result :\

[ZappBrannigan]

For Christ's sake, '... but damn thats just boring.' is your personal opinion... is it unimagineable that others would find value and relative coolness in this?

586382318[/snapback]

Yea thats his personal opinion, You can only give your own opinion!

I dont like the look of that either, but if somebody wants to do that, let em!

[Advance]

The goal of this guide is basicly to emulate the look of bb or bblean etc staying with the explorer shell, that is possible along with the other guides I have posted. If you don't like the look thats fine, but I have been asked to write one and many people have wanted an iconless XP. If you arent a minimalist, ok! If you are Great!, me to! We all know this is a messageboard and everyone can have their own opinions so there is no need to argue about it.

[Nighthawk-F117]

I fail to see why one would wish to delete all their icons, but to each his own...

586382072[/snapback]

Ditto.

[Orange]

Not very good...

[Mx]

Interesting, but I'd hate not to have icons :)

[dis]

i think easiest way to add these keys to the registry:

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\WindowMetrics]

Small Shell Icon Size = 0 //originally it is 32 i think

Shell Icon Size = 0 // originally 32 or 16?

Shell Icon BPP = 0 // 16 or 32

"all" menu icons, explorer folder icons will be gone.

i am also icon hater. icons? who needs them! :D iconless XP @ http://desorder.cjb.net

[Tevage]

I love it

[Advance]

i think easiest way to add these keys to the registry:

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Control Panel\Desktop\WindowMetrics]

Small Shell Icon Size = 0 //originally it is 32 i think

Shell Icon Size = 0 // originally 32 or 16?

Shell Icon BPP = 0 // 16 or 32

"all" menu icons, explorer folder icons will be gone.

i am also icon hater. icons? who needs them! :D iconless XP @ http://desorder.cjb.net

586388240[/snapback]

Good indeed and for a while I used that! But now I like to select a few icons that I made and use them (3 in total) on my desktop, they go with the theme great. Also, you will see a slight preformance increase after deleting the icons in explorer - it takes up less memory.

Thanks for the trick though,

-Advance

[mr_demilord]

I prefer MS-DOS then this, it's just horrible to look at it.

[Advance]

I prefer MS-DOS then this, it's just horrible to look at it.

586402039[/snapback]

Coming from someone who spends most their time at the poll station and doesn't have crap to show for in this forum, I don't really care.

I made this guide for people looking for the look of any fluxbox window's port without running a shell over it. I happen to like it, and the people I made it for liked it to. I posted it here as an afterthought so OTHER people could benifit.

If you don't like the look thats fine, but if your going to insult, keep it to yourself.

-Advance

[Zlain]

er, in your first post you say thats the simple way? I'd hate to see the hard way :whistle:

[chavo]

I just picked up my computer and shook it really hard and all of the icons fell out.

Should I recycle, or just trash them?

[Mastertech]

I don't get the point either. You might as well use the command line. ;) But I can appreciate the effort to even try to do this.

[DarkFlameGTS]

i know a easy way to get rid of the icons, right click your desktop, go to "show icons by", and uncheck show icons

[Gerryb]

I am not sure why the excellent idea of removing icons caused such outrage on this board.

Pictures are mood music and background noise. They do not impart infomation.

An icon of an envelope mean nothing on its own. But the word Email says it all. The image imposes and extra language on top to tire your brain.

I am in the medical field so here goes:An NMR scan of the brain is very pretty to look at, but to get the information on which to act, we need to interpret the images into a series of statements....words in fact. Mostly humans do that, but machines could take on that role. The picture itself is no good. Nice to look at, like a face or piece of art. It is made up of data but is not information.

G.P.s get x-ray reports. Which is what we need, a text report not the picture.

Images are little more than mood music and background noise. I have not worked out how much of the 22mb a month the National Health Service sends my practice manager is images...must be well over 95% of stuff saying nothing.

So I would love to see how much slicker and faster Windows Xp would be devoid of all images. It can still be GUI in that you can click on words in boxes, if you must, but quick keys are even better. So lets have an icon free Windows and Office products.

This is not a matter of being minimalist, but of producing a more ergonimic interface.

My Webpage