In this article you will see how to customize your hard drive icons in Windows using autorun.inf. This method applies to any version of Windows, including Windows 10.
If you use multiple external drives or have multiple partitions on your hard disks with everyone doing different work and saving different types of data, then you might want to give them your own labels for easy and fast tracking. Even better than the name, it would be to set a custom icon to make it even faster to locate with a visual indication of the type of disc.
But let's see how you can do it. Let's take for example a system that contains the C: drive which contains the operating system and preletterthe, the D: drive which has all your personal data and folders, the E: drive which stores the archives media, the F: drive that has backups, and the G: drive that contains a few portable apps that are used from time to time.
To customize the icon of each disk, make one file for each drive and name autorun.inf. Put it at the beginning of each hard drive (or drive if you have partitions) and for each drive specify the name of the icon you want in the following way:
[AUTORUN] Icon = icon_name.ico
The icon may be an .ico file or even an icon inside an .exe or .dll file. Below you can see a sample autorun.inf file that uses a custom icon named software.ico.
Of course at the beginning of the disk, along with the autorun.inf file you will also put the file of the icon you are referring to. Also, if you have a specific folder that stores all the icons, you can type the path of your hard drive within autorun.inf until you reach that folder. But it's better for us to be at the beginning of each disc, especially if it's a removable drive.
If your removable drive already has an autorun.inf file then go to the [AUTORUN] section and simply add (or if present change) the Icon. Optionally, these two files can be set as "hidden" through the file properties so that they don't visually disturb you when you see the root directory of the drive.
Repeat the above procedure for each Windows drive for which you want to customize its icon.
Restart the Windows and your tray icons need to be changed! Now, see how easy it is to recognize one's discs.
