This is written for Windows Vista, but will probably work on XP and 7 too.
Sometimes that little icon that tells you how much battery you have left, or how strong the wifi is just disappears for no apparent reason. One way to get it back is by restarting your whole computer, but there is a quicker way.
First open Task Manager by right clicking the bar at the bottom of the screen (the Taskbar.)
Next go to the processes tab and find explorer.exe
End the process.
Go to File > New Task (Run...)
Type "explorer.exe" in the box and it will load up again, hopefully with the correct icons.
If you still don't see the icons, right click on the taskbar and go to properties, then go to the notification area tab and you should be able to tick the checkboxes for the icons you want shown.
