Finally there is a possible workaround for the missing icons in the Vista Notification Area, see my post from march 2007. The workaround is documented in KB945011 - “System icons may not appear in the notification area on a Windows Vista-based computer until you restart the computer”.
It’s the network, power and volume icons in the notification area that suffers from this problem. The KB article pins down the cause due to heavy processing on a Vista based machine during the first startup and that it typically not reoccur after the first reboot. This is because of the “welcome sequence” in Vista that initializes services and applications for the first time.
My post on this is one of the most visited posts I’ve had the last year so I think it’s more common than the KB article states…
Anyway there are now a workaround, which involves some registry hacking, and killing the explorer process. This workaround has been documented for some time on Samuel’s Blog, and I have tried it.
But I’m sad to say that this one does not always work, it worked when the explorer process was started again, but after a reboot I had my problems once again.
Anyway I have had little of these problems the last few months, so I guess my machine is now “initialized” - only took about eight months…
Thanks to Jack that hinted me to the KB article.