Autorun.inf files are normally used on CDs and DVDs. The files are used to
autorun or autoplay the disk as soon as it's placed in the drive. But
autorun.infs have another feature.
Autorun.inf files can have a line that points to an icon file (.ico) like
below:
[autorun]
open=autorun.exe
icon=autorun.ico
The purpose being so that when you place a disk in the CD or DVD drive, the
drive icon changes to whatever the disk programmer wanted. Say it was a
Word Perfect install disk, then those folks would want one of their icons to
display.
You can create an autorun.inf file like:
[autorun]
icon=custom.ico
place it in any hard drive and customize that drive's icon. The custom.ico
also has to be in the same location, i.e. in the root of the E: drive in
order for the custom icon to display. If the custom.ico file is not in the
root of the E: drive along with the autorun.inf file a generic icon appears
because Windows gets confused.
* You can use an autorun.inf to customize a hard drive icon.
* An autorun.inf that gets placed on a hard drive by mistake causes a
generic drive icon to appear.
The last item seems to be a common problem. I do not know why it happens
and nobody seems to worry about why, they just say to delete it.
You can also customize a drive's icon with a registry entry.
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Hope this helps. Let us know.
Wes
MS-MVP Windows Shell/User
In