By default, Windows Explorer displays a generic icon for all DLL files. Some poor DLLs actually offer their own icons. So if you'd like to know at a glance which ones have icons, you'll need to go through the following procedure. Remember that this tweak will cause the first icon contained in a DLL to be displayed in Windows Explorer.
Navigate to:
HCR\dllfile\DefaultIcon
Back up the key you are about to modify: highlight "(Default)" in the right frame and select Export Registry File... . Save the file to the location of your choice, so if you don't like the results of this tweak, double-click the exported file to undo the changes you are about to make.
Then, right click "(Default)" and choose Modify. Replace all the information contained in the Value data: field with %1. Now reboot and launch Windows Explorer. Look at the file called Shell.dll in C:\Windows\System and note that it - and many other DLLs - now display an icon of their own!
