Volume and Network Icons Dissappear

[Questor]

Virtually every time I start up my new laptop (Vista Home Premium SP2) I
have to screw around booting and rebooting until the two icons for
Volume and Network appear in my notification area.

I first tried going to the Properties tab of Notification Area, but the
checkboxes for Volume and Network were, for some reason, greyed out.
Sometimes, not always though, I can "ungrey" them by continual rebooting
until they appear. When they do, I check them and verify that the icons
have indeed appeared.

The very next time I start up my computer I have to go through all these
contortions yet again to bring the checkboxes back.

What the heck is going on? Is there some sort of Registry entry I can
make to avoid having to keep rebooting?

Questor

 

[t-4-2]

I am sure many users will rush to show off some of their " geeky " registry
fixes.
I had your issue many times. All I had to do the the DOWN-TO-EARTH system
restore, choosing the date you had all the icons present in the notification
area.

t-4-2

 

[Questor]

--->

Virtually every time I start up my new laptop (Vista Home Premium SP2) I
have to screw around booting and rebooting until the two icons for
Volume and Network appear in my notification area.

I first tried going to the Properties tab of Notification Area, but the
checkboxes for Volume and Network were, for some reason, greyed out.
Sometimes, not always though, I can "ungrey" them by continual rebooting
until they appear. When they do, I check them and verify that the icons
have indeed appeared.

The very next time I start up my computer I have to go through all these
contortions yet again to bring the checkboxes back.

What the heck is going on? Is there some sort of Registry entry I can
make to avoid having to keep rebooting?

Questor

An interesting addendum: If I start up Task Manager and kill
'explorer.exe' then browse for a new task and start up 'explorer.exe'
again all is well and I can check the boxes to give me back my icons.
Also of note: when this happens, my 'auto-hide' of the whole taskbar
won't happen even though the checkbox for this is checked.

I don't really like killing explorer so if anyone can offer an
alternative I'd appreciate it very much.

Questor

 

[Grand_Poobah]

Well, that's primarily every previous day though. Doing system restores
is an OK practice once in a while, but I don't really want to be doing
them each and every day of the previous day's restoration point.

Questor


--->

 

[Questor]

Thanks, Shawn. Those two 'hide/show' registry files just might do the
trick. Next time it happens I'll see.

Questor


--->

 

[Questor]

Shawn:

I re-started the laptop from a cold start and, sure enough, the boxes
were greyed out again (and the icons were missing). I ran the 'show
icons' registry file and the boxes appeared, I checked them, hit Apply,
and the icons appeared. So, it looks like those two files were what I
needed.

I really didn't like killing explorer and restarting it, plus rebooting
is such a hassle. What really bothers me is WHY this is happening and
keeps happening. It started about a month ago after one of those update
sessions MS is so fond of (4 or 5 updates but you have to shut down your
computer while it does the actual update ["Do not shut your computer
off..."]). Usually, after one of those sessions, something or other
will go wrong.

Thanks again

Questor

--->

 

[Sheila114]

My network and volume icons are missing too all of a sudden. My text to
speech for MS Reader also stopped functioning. I was having to uninstall the
text to speech and reinstall everytime I opened the Reader program but at
least it would work. Now even the uninstall and reinstall don't get it to
work.

Earlier today my Verbose on my PC also stopped working and it said it
couldn't find any speech engine. I downloaded and installed a new speech
engine and finally have Verbose working again although I no longer have the
MS Default Female voice that I liked and was using.

My Laptop, which is the one I'm referring to, is only 2 months old too.
It's a dell running Vista 32 bit. I really liked having the text to speech
function in Reader since my eyes are not that good. I noticed that the fix
recommended earlier in this thread was for Vista 64 bit. Will this also work
for my PC? And does anyone have any insight into the speech issue? Any help
would be appreciated. Thanks.

Shawn:

I re-started the laptop from a cold start and, sure enough, the boxes
were greyed out again (and the icons were missing). I ran the 'show
icons' registry file and the boxes appeared, I checked them, hit Apply,
and the icons appeared. So, it looks like those two files were what I
needed.

I really didn't like killing explorer and restarting it, plus rebooting
is such a hassle. What really bothers me is WHY this is happening and
keeps happening. It started about a month ago after one of those update
sessions MS is so fond of (4 or 5 updates but you have to shut down your
computer while it does the actual update ["Do not shut your computer
off..."]). Usually, after one of those sessions, something or other
will go wrong.

Thanks again

Questor

--->

You're welcome Questor. Please keep us informed.

 

[Questor]

Sheila:

I see no reason why they wouldn't work in your case either. I just
downloaded the two files and stored them on my desktop for easy access.
When the icons disappear, I double-click the appropriate file and let
it reinstall the registry entry. Following that, I just "switch user"
but go right back to the same user and my icons are back.

I hope that someone is taking note of this somewhere and are trying to
find out why the update is killing the icons.

As for your sound issue I can only offer this thought. Mine was doing
something similar: I would get an email, or an IM and either there was
no sound notification OR I would get just the tail end of the sound. My
investigation showed that since I was using powered speakers they would
go into a kind of 'sleep mode'. It took a couple of jabs from the
operating system to 'wake' them up. But, if I plugged in some unpowered
speakers the sound never went away and would produce sound immediately
on request. If you are using your laptop speakers, try temporarily
plugging in some unpowered external speakers.

Questor

--->

My network and volume icons are missing too all of a sudden. My text to
speech for MS Reader also stopped functioning. I was having to uninstall the
text to speech and reinstall everytime I opened the Reader program but at
least it would work. Now even the uninstall and reinstall don't get it to
work.

Earlier today my Verbose on my PC also stopped working and it said it
couldn't find any speech engine. I downloaded and installed a new speech
engine and finally have Verbose working again although I no longer have the
MS Default Female voice that I liked and was using.

My Laptop, which is the one I'm referring to, is only 2 months old too.
It's a dell running Vista 32 bit. I really liked having the text to speech
function in Reader since my eyes are not that good. I noticed that the fix
recommended earlier in this thread was for Vista 64 bit. Will this also work
for my PC? And does anyone have any insight into the speech issue? Any help
would be appreciated. Thanks.

Shawn:

I re-started the laptop from a cold start and, sure enough, the boxes
were greyed out again (and the icons were missing). I ran the 'show
icons' registry file and the boxes appeared, I checked them, hit Apply,
and the icons appeared. So, it looks like those two files were what I
needed.

I really didn't like killing explorer and restarting it, plus rebooting
is such a hassle. What really bothers me is WHY this is happening and
keeps happening. It started about a month ago after one of those update
sessions MS is so fond of (4 or 5 updates but you have to shut down your
computer while it does the actual update ["Do not shut your computer
off..."]). Usually, after one of those sessions, something or other
will go wrong.

Thanks again

Questor

--->

You're welcome Questor. Please keep us informed.


Questor;1142059 Wrote:
Thanks, Shawn. Those two 'hide/show' registry files just might do the
trick. Next time it happens I'll see.

Questor


--->> > >
Hello Questor,

You might see if this may be able to help.


http://www.vistax64.com/tutorials/106787-notification-area-system-icons.html
Hope this helps,
Shawn

Questor;1142012 Wrote:> > > > >
Virtually every time I start up my new laptop (Vista Home Premium
SP2) I
have to screw around booting and rebooting until the two icons for
Volume and Network appear in my notification area.

I first tried going to the Properties tab of Notification Area, but
the
checkboxes for Volume and Network were, for some reason, greyed out.
Sometimes, not always though, I can "ungrey" them by continual
rebooting
until they appear. When they do, I check them and verify that the
icons
have indeed appeared.

The very next time I start up my computer I have to go through all
these
contortions yet again to bring the checkboxes back.

What the heck is going on? Is there some sort of Registry entry I
can
make to avoid having to keep rebooting?

Questor> > > >