Some programs show their icon in the system tray – also called the notification area. When a program shows its icon, the icon and program is registered by Windows XP. Even after that program is deleted or uninstalled, the notification area list of programs remains in the Registry. If you want to cleanup and rebuild this list, then follow these easy instructions :
To view your current notification area list, right-click on the system tray near where clock is displyed (bottom-right corner of most of the desktop). Select Customize Notifications… from the menu. You would see something like this :
To cleanup and rebuild this notification area list :
- Press the keyboard combination Windows logo key + R to bring up the Run dialog. In Run dialog, type regedit.exe and press Enter to start the Windows Registry editor.
- In the Registry Editor, navigate to the following key :
HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftWindowsCurrentVersionExplorerTrayNotify
- You would find the values named IconStreams and PastIconStream in the right side pane. Right click on both of them and select Delete to delete these values.
- Restart your computer for the changes to take effect.