How can I get back that lovely Google "G" icon that originally
appeared on my desktop whemn I first created a shortcut, but which
then mysteriously "morphed into a very ordinary non-"G"icon? I am
unable to recreate it. Can you tell me how to create a GOOGLE "G" that "sticks"?

Thanks in advance for your help.
RG

Hi there,

This happened to me recently, and I was surprised by the reason.

What is a Favicon?
------------------

It is a little (16x16) image which shows up in the Internet Explorer
address bar, favorites and desktop shortcuts. It starts out as a file
called favicon.ico on a website, and most big and popular websites
have one. When IE visits a web page, it looks for a favicon. If it
exists, it will appear in the address bar, and if you add the page to
your favorites, or as a desktop shortcut, it will appear instead of
the usual IE icon.

A favicon has disappeared. What happened? 
-----------------------------------------

Favicons are cached similarly to html documents. When they are deleted
from the cache, they revert to the standard IE icon. If you want to
prevent the icon from disappearing:

1. Create a local directory (e.g., c:\favicons) 
2. Copy the desired favicon into the directory created above. 
3. Right click the mouse over the favorite/bookmark and select
properties.
4. Enter the path (or use the 'browse' feature) to the favicon you
want for that bookmark.

Another temporary solution is to hold down the mouse button while
holding shift over the default IE icon in the address bar and then let
go of the mouse button anywhere in the address bar. This seems to
'update' the favicon.
http://www.favicon.com/index.jsp?id=Internet+Explorer#3-4

In my opinion, this is terrible! Favicons are wonderful, but the whole
purpose is defeated if they are only temporary. They should last as
long as there is an entry in your bookmarks, or a shortcut on the
desktop.

The solution to your problem is to use the instructions above. The
Google favicon is at:
://www.google.com/favicon.ico


Search strategy: Direct visit to favicon.com


Best wishes,
robertskelton-ga

Not sure why it's changed from a G to a non-G; the easiest thing to do
is probably just delete the shortcut and then re-create it.  However,
if you want to make 100% sure it never changes:

Go to the Google home page, and enter any old search criteria,
providing it'll return more than one page of results.

Scroll down to the bottom of the page, and right-click on the "G" of
"Gooooooooooogle".  A menu will pop up; from here follow the
instructions relevant to your version of Windows.

Windows XP: click on "Save picture as", and select "Bitmap" as the
file type, give it a sensible name (such as "Google G") and save it
somewhere safe -- C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\ is probably as good a place as
any.

Windows 9x/Me/NT/2000: click on "Copy".  Open Paint
(Start/Accessories/Paint), set the image size to 1x1 pixels (it's in
"Image properties" or somewhere -- I don't have 9x installed anywhere
any more so I can't check, sorry!)  Now select Edit/Paste; Paint will
ask you if you want the image enlarged -- click "Yes".  Now select
File/Save, and save the picture as a bitmap somewhere safe -- see the
XP instructions above.

All versions: once the "G" is saved somewhere, right click on the
shortcut icon.  Click on "Change icon..." and type the path and
filename you saved the "G" as, for example "C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM\Google
G.bmp".  Click "Ok" then "Ok" again, and that's it!

Now right-click on the shortcut on your desktop, then click on "Change
icon..."  Click "Browse"

I had the same question a couple of years ago when I already had well
over 500 favorites and dozens of bland default shortcuts on my
desktop. All of the above answers are correct but would be extremely
tedious and time consuming to apply to hundreds of bookmarks. A far
easier solution with added benefits is to download a small (364Kb),
free, program called FavOrg. It's available at PC Magazine's website
at "www.pcmag.com/article2/0,4149,108438,00.asp". Or just use Google
and type "favorg", it'll be at the top of the list. I've been using it
for over 2 years and I highly recommend it. The first time it "fixed"
my hundreds of bookmarks took 15 to 30 min. for it to scan them all.
Now I just run it whenever I've saved some bookmarks and it takes
maybe a minute. It'll save all the pretty little favicons in your
favorites folder as well as any shortcuts on your desktop or anywhere
else. If you use a custom or downloaded icon it'll save them too. It
makes the desktop and favorites folder a lot nicer to look at and
easier to scan with your eyes. It's very useful and works on all
windows platforms.