Desktop Background Issues

[RotoVegas]

Hi guys, we're having an annoying issue with desktop backgrounds in our VMware environment. It's not a major issue but we would like our staff to have some level of personal customisation if we can.

What we've found is that JPG images do not work as desktop background images. At the Operating System level it shows that the selected image is applied to the desktop background but it won't display on the actual desktop.

If the image is a Bitmap file then it works but if the VDI terminal is switched off or goes into standby mode then the background image is lost. During testing we found that if the user logs off/on then the image will stick. Also it will stick after a recompose of the template.

We don't have any group policies related to desktop themes or the use of background images.

Has anyone else had this issue?

[eeg3]

Are you using RDP or PCoIP?

[RotoVegas]

Hi Earl, we're running PCoIP.

Thanks, Lane.

[eeg3]

How are you mandating the desktop background? Default User Profile? If so, ignoring Composer altogether, do you get the wallpaper by default on the first login for a new user on the master template VM itself?

[RotoVegas]

The default user profile applies. There are no group policies regarding themes applied. I logged into our master template with a new user account and changed the desktop background. As before it would stick if I log on/off with a Bitmap image but if I use a JPEG image it doesn't.

[mobcdi]

Were you able to find a solution to this as I have a similar problem with XP SP3 desktops. The desktop wallpaper is set via gpo but doesn't get displayed to the user but is listed if you right click on desktop and view properties. I am using a bmp image but also have the gpo policy set to only allow bitmapped images

[RotoVegas]

With regards to this issue we resolved to using Bitmap images only as desktop backgrounds. Our users select these themselves and we haven't had any subsequent problems. Our template is based on a Windows XP SP3 build. We never tested using Group Policy to apply the background image so unfortunately I can't offer any advice other than applying the background image in the base build rather than Group Policy.

[rlitch1978]

If a user wants a desktop background delete the below key and it should work after that.

HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System

Delete the Wallpaper key.

This reverses what the View Windows 7 Optimization tool did to stop the desktop background in the first place.