Desktop icons position not kept

Hi. I'm using 10.6.2 and sometimes (not all) when I start my machine, the desktop icons (which I have arranged by snap to grid) are not where they used to be the last time I was with the cmputer on but they all show up aligned on the right of the screen, next to the hard drive icons in columns. I did not yet find a patteen like "this only happens if I have the computer turned of more than X x or y hours". Sometimes I leave for a couple of days and the icons are good when I come back. Sometimes just a few hours with the computer turned off and the icons position is not kept. Other time is the other way around.
Any ideas? Someone with the same issue?
Thanks.

I had this problem, too, and brought it up with a "Genius" this morning. His solution -- which seems to have worked -- was first to show hidden files (using a utility or Terminal, as described elsewhere) and then delete the .DS_Store file which now appears on the desktop. The file rebuilt itself, and the icons now stay where I put them after a restart or relaunch of the Finder. You should rehide the hidden files once you've done this.
I had previously tried resetting the PRAM and deleting a couple of plist files from the Preferences Library, which other people had recommended, but those solutions didn't work. This did. Thanks, Geniuses in Emeryville.
Rick

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