Start menu duplicate Shortcuts

Question

After the last Windows update (Creators Update) I have a serious problem in the start menu...

Some shortcuts are duplicate.

So far I tried various methods without any luck:

• Remove from start (I removed 1 icon and all the duplicates vanish at the same time), then I pin again the shortcut (all the duplicates came back to life)..

• Delete Shortcut form the folder (all the shortcuts vanish), then if I pin again, all the duplicates came back plus 1 new shortcut (so if I had 3 shortcut before deleting, now I'll have 4).

• I tried cleaning using CCleaner without any luck

• I tried to search in regedit also.

I forgot to mention that all the duplicates (for the same program) have the same path and the same shortcut, also some of those icons are unusable (not clickable, nor draggable...

Any advice? it's really disturbing...

Answer 1

Your TileDataLayer has been corrupted or damaged.

Run the following command to see if it helps.

Open Powershell as an Administrator. This will reset your TileDataLayer cache, re-register applications in the start menu, and reset the layout.

Give it about 10 minutes to complete, and reboot the machine.

-edit, several years later. The responses here are correct, this was deprecated in 1607 and removed in later versions.

TDLrecover.exe -resetcache -resetlayout -reregister -allowparallel

If this does not resolve your issue, your profile is corrupt and needs to be recreated.

Answer 2

This answer is for Windows build 15063 (Creator Update)

If Charlie C's answer doesn't work (in my case It's even get worse, having triplicate to three tiles per shortcut), please try this:

1. Go to the start menu shortcut folder (e.g. C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs). Locate the problematic shortcut, made a copy of it to the same folder.

2. Unpin the last problematic tile in the start menu. You will notice that instead of the latest one, the first duplicate disappear instead.

3. Go back to the start menu folder, delete the original problematic shortcut. (keep the copy).

4. Back to start menu, the remaining problematic tiles will change their name to the name of the copy of the shortcut (something like - Copy).

5. Now you have one less duplicate tiles. Repeat step 1-4 until a single tile of the shortcut left.

Answer 3

I've had the very same issue with one application called mRemoteNG myself. I fixed it the following way, without resetting all of the tiles nor using the command line or PowerShell:

I searched for the shortcut of the App that is double in both directories.

1.: %appdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu

and

2.: C:\ProgramData\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs

I just made a backup copy of the shortcut and put it on my desktop; then I moved the original shortcut of the app from the 1st location to the 2nd one.

The reason for that is, windows will delete the shortcut from that location if you remove the tile in the start menu and also will add one if you add a shortcut to that location.

So I moved the shortcut, waited a few seconds, opened the start menu, icons both were still there. Then I removed one of them; the other just disappears a few seconds after. Also does the shortcut from that directory.

What you have to do now is either copy the backup shortcut from the desktop or make another shortcut of the app you want to pin to the start menu and copy it to the very same 2nd location. Wait a few seconds, and the tile appears in the start menu once. There is no double entry for that app anymore.