Try to reset the Windows icon cache. * Open the Task Manager (Shift+Ctrl+ESC) * In the Process tab, right-click on the Explorer.exe process and select End Process. * Open the file picker via "File > New Task (Run)" and click the Browse button. * Type or Paste %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local in the File name field (AppData is a hidden folder). * Select the file IconCache.db and use Delete in the right-click context menu to delete the file. * After the IconCache.db has been deleted, start a new explorer.exe process via "File > New Task" to get the desktop and Taskbar back. * It is possible that the file IconCache.db is a hidden file and in that case you need to enable viewing hidden files. You can verify that you can see the file before doing the above mentioned steps. See http://kb.mozillazine.org/Show_hidden_files_and_folders