All icons in desktop and Start menu has changed to Internet Explorer icon

Recently I have started facing some problems with my laptop which is running Windows 7 in it. I had some icons of games, to be specific World of Warcraft, on the desktop. All the icons on the desktop as well as on the Start menu of my computer have changed to the icon of Internet Explorer. Also all the files and icons are ending with .LNK instead of the usual .EXE format. Does anyone know what must be the reason behind all this and what should I do to solve this issue? Please, give me some suggestions.

Your computer has got infected with some kind of malicious germs or viruses. These viruses might be the sole reason behind this unusual behavior of your desktop and Start menu icons. Do you remember visiting any suspicious website on Internet or connecting some sort of infected pendrive to your computer? Because there can be many reasons behind this infection. I would suggest you to install a very good Anti-virus along with some Anti-spyware or Anti-malware in your computer, so that your computer is kept protected from future virus attacks. You can try free antivirus like AVG and AVAST. Also remember to keep your antivirus updated. You should perform complete system scan so that infected files and folders are detected. Delete them permanently or heal them if possible.

It’s mentioned in your post that all the files are ending with .LNK. They are usually shortcut link of the main files to the registry entries. I am not sure about this but there are chances that some installed program or update must have corrupted or edited the registry entries of these files. So I would recommend you to perform registry cleaning to remove all the unnecessary broken links and the perform registry defragmentation. You can use any third party software, like TuneUp Utilities or CCleaner to do registry cleaning. The TuneUp Utilities have got the feature to even perform registry defragmentation along with the normal disk fragmentation. You can search for the software on Internet and download them from their respective official website. Install the software by following the on-screen instruction and then run the application. The application is very simple to understand so you will be able to figure out all the features easily.

You should create a new user account and check whether you are facing the same problem while you are using that new user account. You can create new user account by performing the following steps:

• Go to Start > Control Panel > User Accounts (if your computer to a network domain, then you will have to click on User Accounts and Family Safety to view the User Accounts link.)
• Click On the “Manage another account” option.
• Enter the password if you are prompted for any administrator password and confirm the process.
• Now click on the “Create a new account” option to create a new account.
• Follow the on-screen instruction and finally click on Create Account option.
• If everything is working well in the new account then you will have to fix your current user profile. Or you can transfer all your files and folder to the new profile.

According to me the best solution which will surely help you to solve your problem is that you must perform System Restore. This will undo all the system changes that the computer went through without affecting the personal files. But remember that System restore will undo any installed application as well. So it is preferable to take back up of all your important information, files and folders. Follow the below steps to perform system restore of your computer:

1. Go to Start menu and type System Restore on the search box. Select System Restore from the given options.
2. If you are prompted for any administrator password, then enter the password and provide confirmation to open the System Restore window.
3. Select the Restore point as per your convenience and click Next.
4. Allow the system to complete the system restore and restart your computer whenever it is prompted to you.

Hey people, Thank you for your generous help. It seems there were some issues with the registry key entries. I downloaded TuneUp Utilities as someone mentioned in the above post and installed it in my system. Performed registry clean followed by registry defragmentation and half my problem was solved. Now only icons on the desktop were showing the image link of Internet Explorer. Then performed the System Restore to a restore point which was 2 to 3 days back and luckily it solved all the problems. So again thanks guys.