Question: All of my desktop shortcut icons on Windows 7 have changed to Notepad icons.

How do I get my old icons back?

Answer: 
Try this:

Reset the desktop icon cache

1. Click Start, and open Computer.
2. On the Tool bar, click Organize and choose Folder and Search Options.
3. Click the View tab, and check to select the Show hidden files and folders option, and click OK.
4. Then, enter the following directory:

C:\Users(User Name)\AppData\Local

1. Find the IconCache.db file, and rename it as IconCache.db.old.
2. Close the window, and restart the computer.
Right click the icon that is appearing in wrong format.
(You need to find out the file location that is wrong.)
This will help if all your icons have changed to Notepad, Adobe or whatever.
The file location will say either `.lnk`, `.exe`, `.jpeg` and so on.
This is called a registry error.

Here's how to fix it.

* Click the start button on the bottom left of the computer screen.
* Type `regedit` in the search box.
* Click yes if it pops up.
* then go to `HKEY_CURRENT_USER`
	+ Software -> Microsoft -> Windows -> Current Version -> Explorer -> File Exts
* Then, find what extension all your icons are showing up as, whether its `.lnk`, `.exe` and double click on it.
* Right click `User Choice` then delete it.
* Click yes.
* You will need to restart your computer and then
all of your icons will be back to normal.