So users who just lock their PC at night and not logoff, don't see the change, and if we are asked by the business to only change the wallpaper at a set time in the day (to coincide with some news or launch), it won't take effect on users computers until they log out and back in, which they don't do during the day if they can avoid it. Unless user logs out and back in, they will continue to have Wallpaper A. for specifying wallpaper beyond the basic Group Policy setting. Using Group Policy Preferences you can finely target groups of users or computers, set dates, etc.
IT Admin modifies GPO or the GPO preference is set to change to Wallpaper B on a set date. Our issue is that Wallpaper A is set via Group Policy Preference, users login in the morning and get Wallpaper A. Glad that worked for you, but that's not the issue my thread is based on.
#Windows 7 cracked screen wallpaper update
It's an improvement and sure to surprise everyone, but I just wish Microsoft would fix WIndows 7 to update both instantly like XP did for wallpaper. It would be nice if the locked screen did a refresh (you can see the circle egg timer when it's doing GP refresh while locked), but it's not as bad since it could lock later or at least at lunch time if the change is made in the morning. This change applied without needing a log off, however if the screen is currently locked it won't change until the next time it's locked. to further enhance (or promote/spam whatever the business is raving on about), I've made another complex Group Preferences Policy to change the lock screen background to match what the desktop wallpaper should be. In the days of Windows XP, wallpaper would change instantly.Īnother interesting note. What surprises me though, is googling people don't mention it, just the "Black/Blank" screen issue. I've tried a gpupdate /force but really, this should just work through GPO, since the registry has updated and the preview of desktop wallpaper on the Personalize screen has updated with the change, but the actual desktop wallpaper hasn't, my guess here is it's a bug with Windows 7. Please help, anyone else experience this issue? Have a solution? I've tried this hotfix, it hasn't worked, nor do we get the blank/black desktop issue others appear to complain about: http:/ / / kb/ 977944 Sadly we have a requirement to change the wallpaper during the day, sometimes to coincide with the activation of another service. The only thing that works is to log off and back in again, however, most users login in the morning and only log off at the end of the working day. Locking and unlocking the screen does not work.Ĭlosing explorer.exe and restarting it (often used in Windows XP days to force registry changes to explorer to take effect. Right-clicking the desktop and choosing refresh doesn't work (not that I'd want it to) If you check Personalization from the desktop, you can see the Desktop Background preview shows the new wallpaper, yet the desktop does not. This works on Windows XP, however on Windows 7, we get the issue that currently logged on users do not receive the new wallpaper when Group Policy does a refresh. I have also tried Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System\Wallpaper We have some complex requirements for Desktop Wallpaper, based on dates it must be certain wallpaper for certain groups of users, to accomplish these requirements I've used a Group Policy and Preferences within to copy files from a network share to the local hard drive and set the registry entry to the new wallpaper: