Windows 7 W7 Not recognizing many programs (screenshots inside)

[TrickPony]

I have a very odd problem that happened out of the blue. W7 Home Premium 32 bit, no viruses or recently installed programs. As you can see in the screenshots, theres that "icon" that says the OS doesn't recognize the program. MANY of them. What can be causing this, any help would be appreciated. Thank you much.

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[Saltgrass]

Well, the first thing is Win 7 has a screen capture utility called Snipping Tool. It is very easy to use and gives a great presentation, that can be edited to show your situation.

The error message you attached came from doing what exactly? And try to narrow down problems to just one commonly used program?

 

[TrickPony]

Salt, thank you for your response. And the heads up on the Snipping tool.

The error message comes after a reboot. BUT the issue is all the icons - the icons that show that the OS doesn't recognize.

Like when going to My Computer - C: then Windows. The Windows folder has that icon in the screenshots. When clicking it I get the message: C:\Windows - application not found.

 

[Saltgrass]

So if you try to open the Windows folder, you get that error...

Is there anything unusual about your install? Have you changed any drives around, cloned anything?

What is the Change Icon option with a Command Window. Did the problem occur after you installed that?

If you right click the Windows symbol and select properties, what does it show. And you can attach the picture here using the paperclip.

It seems you have lost the normal links from your icons. If it was just the icons, using the procedure of deleting the icon cache, or whatever that process is for Win 7 might help, but it seems the link has been broken.