Disappearing Icons, "This PC" is empty, infinite loading folders.

[iMandoz]

Hello as you can see in the title I have had this issue for about a month now, I have searched and found many solutions but none of them worked.

For some reason "This PC" is totally empty and loads for an unlimited time with nothing showing up, all Icons are changed to the unknown file icon whether it's music files or exe files or anything really, sometimes Recycle Bin's icon disappear completely too. Restarting the pc fixes it for a while then it comes back on.

I have tried downloading Windows Tweak and running it in safe mode and it didn't work

I tried to do the sfc /scannow in cmd and it didn't work

I tried the folder options to see if anything is disabled but it's fine and it's set to show the thumbnails, tried system restore too. Basically the only option here is to reinstall windows which I really don't want to do unless I really have to.

Hopefully someone got a solution for this, thanks in advance.

Specs: Windows 8.1 64 bit
Core i3 6100
8 GB Ram
GTX 750 Ti

 

[vrumor]

Reinstalling Windows would have taken a lot less time than the time you have spent trying to fix your issue. Sometimes, reinstalling is the only option.

 

[iMandoz]

Reinstalling Windows would have taken a lot less time than the time you have spent trying to fix your issue. Sometimes, reinstalling is the only option.

What if I do that and the issue comes back then? What's the point? I'll leave this for couple of days if I got no answer then I'm just gonna reinstall.

 

[vrumor]

If the issue comes back then, youll have to keep looking for whats causing it, its called troubleshooting. Reinstalling an OS takes 20 minutes, not sure why you are so against it.

 

[iMandoz]

Because I live in Egypt mate and my download rate is 60 kb/sec and redownloading all softwares is a huge pain, specially GPA driver takes like an hour by itself and sadly I don't have anything on the hard disk that I can easily renstall. Thanks for your answers tho

 

[vrumor]

That would certainly be a good reason why, but unfortunately, it may be your only option.

 

[NathanBock]

To me, it sounds like a virus. Could also be corrupt system files. But I guess if it were corrupt system files it would've been permanent, also after restart.

I would just reinstall windows but in your case you can also try something else. Try finding a better option in the Windows Repair screen. If thats what it's called. Just restart your pc while holding in shift.