Monterey - Desktop Pictures Pane Blank

Question

Monterey - Desktop Pictures Pane Blank

I'm reaching out for help with a Monterey issue, although it could be a problem unrelated to Monterey.

When I select 'Desktop & Screen Saver' in System Preferences I get a blank window in the desktop pictures tab - nothing at all. Selecting the Screen Saver tab shows all the screen saver options and is completely normal.

I can manually 'right click' an image and set it as a desktop image via the drop down menu so there's nothing wrong with the desktop picture functionality. i've check in System/Library/Desktop Pictures and all the system pictures are in there including the legacy ones and the animated ones, so all good there.

The computer is a late 2015 27" iMac and I did a clean install of Monterey followed by some selective file and app moving using the Migration Tool. This worked perfectly. Today i updated Monterey to v12.2 and that hasn't fixed the problem although it has fixed the issue of sometimes having to double click twice on a file to open it but that's another issue!

iMac 27″, macOS 12.2

Posted on Feb 3, 2022 2:47 AM

Reply

Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

PRP_53

Level 10

91,813 points

Feb 3, 2022 2:54 AM in response to Analogue_Ground

Suggestion - restart the computer in Safe Mode SHIFT key immediately at restart.

If does a Repair Disk, clears cache files and only loads Apple Software, extensions and fonts. The loading is slow and this is normal.

Run in this mode to 5 - 7 minutes and test if the issue is presented.

Restart in Normal Mode and test again.

Sometimes, the Safe Mode will put things right again.

Reply

Answer 2

Feb 3, 2022 3:54 AM in response to Analogue_Ground

Success! (ish) Booting in Safe Mode did give me access to the Desktop Pictures pane but there was some corruption to images in their preview state although OK on screen. I kept opening and closing the window and selecting different desktop images until the preview images looked OK. Booting back normally then gave me the Desktop Pictures pane but again with some corruption to images that became worse to the extent that, other than the plain colours, images disappeared.

I have a large photo library which I'm now rebuilding (option + command when opening app) in case its picking up some legacy corruption there. It would be an improvement if there was a means of not having the photos library available in the Desktop Pictures pane!

Thanks again for your help - it's much appreciated. I used to be involved in Mac support back in the days of the Apple II and then the original 128K Mac but have been out of that since the late 90s.

Reply