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Desktop MAJOR Folder/Path Issues

Melissa T 0 Reputation points
2025-10-23T23:18:28.9466667+00:00

I have been through the ringer with MS - multiple departments, calls, chats, posts here. And NO ONE will give me the slightest hint of an answer.

Current Situation (after multiple fix attempts and lots of changing paths/locations):

  1. There is no actual desktop folder (blue folder w little dots on left)
  2. There is a regular folder I call Desktop. I can add/edit/delete files on it when I'm in the folder path
  3. All those changes show on the actual desktop - but nothing on the actual desktop can be add/edit/delete. Any attempt at working on the actual desktop results in:
    0x800401E5: No object for moniker

An unexpected error is keeping you from creating the file

The blue desktop official folder is gone. Not in recycle, not in system backup. No where.

all I want to do is make the regular folder "Desktop" be my actual Desktop Folder (working as the actual desktop, blue icon with three dots).

I do not understand why this has been like 20 hours of my life and no one at MS will do a thing to help me across multiple tickets at least a dozen people and being bounced around different departments.

Microsoft 365 and Office | OneDrive | For home | Windows
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  1. Ian-T 4,725 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator
    2025-10-24T07:26:08.89+00:00

    Hi Melissa T,

    Thank you for posting in Microsoft Q&A Forum.

    I understand that you are facing an issue with your Folder/Path, please try these steps below to help resolve this:

    You can kindly transfer files/folders from one account to another account by copying files and pasting in the destination account.

    Use Windows Explorer to navigate to C:\Users to the account you want to COPY - Right Click on the Folders (and/or files) and COPY - go to the other account and PASTE where you want to put them.

    I hope it helps, please feel free to let me know if you need any further assistance.

    If the answer is helpful, please click "Accept Answer" and kindly upvote it. If you have extra questions about this answer, please click "Comment".  

    Note: Please follow the steps in our documentation to enable e-mail notifications if you want to receive the related email notification for this thread.

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  2. Melissa T 0 Reputation points
    2025-10-24T22:43:16.8633333+00:00

    I have to start a new account and spend 3 days copying/syncing files to get a desktop folder? What does that even mean to start a new account? Will it affect my syncing or account info in any way? @Ian-T

    is there really not a way to just assign a folder to be the "desktop" folder that shows as the actual desktop and has the blue icon with three dots?

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  3. MotoX80 36,816 Reputation points
    2025-10-25T13:40:23.9966667+00:00

    And NO ONE will give me the slightest hint of an answer.

    I'll try to help.

    I'm sorry, I don't see a "blue icon with three dots" anywhere on my Win11 laptop or Win10 VM. Maybe you have something installed that I don't. That might be why you are having trouble getting help.

    Check your OneDrive settings and see if you selected Desktop to be backed up or not.

    User's image

    As you can see, I turned off desktop backup. So, when I look at the properties of the icons on my desktop, I see that their location is C:\Users\My-User-Name\Desktop. Note that some desktop icons are available to all users and are stored in C:\Users\Public\Desktop.

    User's image

    But if you enable OneDrive backup for Desktop, then it gets moved to C:\Users\Your-User-Name\OneDrive\Desktop.

    At some point in time, I had desktop backup enabled on all of the pc's that I have, and in the OneDrive\Desktop folder I see shortcuts to software that is installed in my old Win10 desktop and not my new Win11 laptop. Replicating desktop across all pc's made no sense to me.

    User's image

    You should right click on a few items and in the General tab check the Location. Figure out which "desktop" you are using.

    At the same time, select the Security tab and verify that your account has full control.

    User's image

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