Note the key root: My Computer\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID You WILL need to restart your machine for it to take effect, since the key is read at boot time - the icon object has no way of being notified that it's key in the Registry has changed. It's kind of like needing to refresh a Free Republic web page to see new comments. I just tested it on XP (already did it on Win2K) and, unlike Win2k, there's somewhere else from where the name is being set. Try searching for "Recycle Bin" instead of that long GUID. I found a key that started with "@C:\" with that name, under MUICache, changed the value from "Recycle Bin" to "Trash" and am rebooting now.