Computer help forum: My Computer Is Missing!

Right-click on desktop and select "Properties"

Select the Desktop tab and Customize Desktop button
From the General tab select "Restore Default".

That's it

Sorry I've been away for a few days but here's what I've done so far.
I right clicked on the desktop and brought up Display Properties on the Desktop. Then clicked on Customized Desktop, in the Desktop Items I clicked on the My Computer icon then Restore Defaults then OK then Apply and OK again, nothing happened, no icon or change in the Start menu where it should be, I even restarted the computer just in case I missed a step. I don't know what to do, but I do want to thank you guys for helping me out. You gurus know your stuff and I wish I were as smart as all of you all. I'm not giving though, anymore suggestions I will not hesitate to try except restore my hard drive, I'll do that when I upgrade my megar 80 gig for a much larger one along with a lightscribe DVD burner.

It's a system folder and I should say it's impossible to delete it from the desktop other than not showing it via the properties. But I won't try. Did you look in the Recycle bin already?

Kees

Keeping it empty defeats its purpose: undo deletes.
With the current size of hard disks, who cares for 10 Gb of data there?

Kees

To try to add My Computer back to the Start menu, right-click on the taskbar and select Properties. Select the "Start Menu" tab and click the Customize button next to your selected start menu option ("regular" or classic). Select the Advanced tab and scroll down the "start menu items" list to "My Computer". If it's set to "don't display", pick a display option. If it's already set to display, I'd try the other display option, or maybe try selecting "don't display", then OK, then come back and try changing it back to "display". For the record, my Start menu is set to the "regular" view, not classic. I'm assuming that the classic view has similar options for displaying "My Computer".

FWIW, if you get "My Computer" back in the Start menu and want it back on the desktop as well, you can theoretically just drag&drop it from the Start menu to the desktop. However, that could end up moving it from the Start menu to the desktop, rather than copying it. If that happened, you could hopefully get it back in the Start menu using the procedure above. You could try holding the Control key while you did the drag&drop. In some situations, holding Control during a drag&drop will tell Windows to copy the item instead of moving it. But I can't tell if it will work when dragging and dropping "My Computer" from the Start menu to the desktop.

FWIW, if you had a shortcut to "My Computer" show up on your desktop unexpectedly, and it disappeared from the Start menu at around the same time, then perhaps you accidentally did a drag&drop from the Start menu to the desktop.

Hope this helps.

James

I myself don't use the icon to explore my computer. I hit the "windows" key (in between the CTRL and ALT keys) + the "e" key together. That way I don't need to go to the desktop to explore.

Well I tried both of your suggestions and it seems neither of them worked. I followed your instructions to the letter. I'm a non active Marine and I know how to follow instructions. Thank you for your time and effort in trying to solve my little delima.
John,

This is how my IT dept told me to fix it:
Right click on the "Start" in the Taskbar--lower left of screen
Select "Open"
Window opens showing contents of "Start"
Drag your desktop "My Computer" icon into this window
Close window
Click on "Start"
You should now see My computer.

Well I've tried everybodys suggestions to no avail and nothing has worked so I'll just take it was deleted. It doesn't even show up when I do a search for it. When I upgrade it'll be back when I reinstall XP. Thanks to everyone who tried so hard to solve my dilemma.