I use a freeware program called icon saver to save the positions of the icons on my desktop. It works well for me because when you change resolutions the icon positions can get fubared. heres the link.
http://www.iconsaver.com/index.html
FYI: it saves the icon positions in the registry so you only need to run the program when you want to save or restore the icon positions.
No, this didn't exactly answer your questions but you did ask forother suggestions.
