Windows XP and desktop

[ManiacPony]

XP is beginning to infuriate me, its desktop works completely differentely to other windows implementations. Is there any way I can restore the old style? E.g. When selecting icons holding shift and selecting down a column would only capture those icons in the column, now it picks up the whole rows as well. When adding icons to the desktop it doesn't just add them onto the end of your lcons, it will only arrange them in order as you would do with a folder. This is a pain as I like to have the main icons (My computer, drives etc) set up in the order I like, and then add and remove extra icons and files as I use them. Is there a way round this or am I going to have to go back to Win 2000. :-(

[j2buttonsw]

Right click the task bar > properties > start menu tab > select "classic start menu" > ok

[ManiacPony]

No, that just does the start menu, not the desktop icons.

[j2buttonsw]

Strange, it has always added "My Computer", "My Network Places", "My Documents" and "Internet Explorer" to the desktop whenever I have done it.

[shybearuk]

Take off Auto Arrange Icons from the desktop right-click menu, then you can arrange them in any order that you want.

[ManiacPony]

Missing icons is not the problem, the fact is you can't select icons as you used to be able to do. If you turn off auto arrange your icons are not lined up they just go wherever you put them.

[shybearuk]

Not if you tick 'Auto Align' on the right-click menu. Then the snap to a grid in whichever order you want them