While I was working on the laptop of my brother-in-law, I noticed a very weird spacing (vertically) between the icons.
To remedy the excessive space between the desktop icons, I had to go into the registry to change the values.
Press Windowskey+R and type "regedit". A UAC message will appear, click "Yes".
Now navigate to:
HKEY_CURRENT_USERControl PanelDesktopWindowMetrics
You have to look for these values:
IconSpacing
IconVerticalSpacing
The values are NEGATIVE, so make sure, whatever value you use is negative as well.
I understand that these values should be between -2750 and -480.
Change the values and reboot you PC (or Log Off and Log On again).
I have seen a few "default" values ... -1128 and -1175 ... but you'll have to find the ideal setting for yourself with trial-and-error.
Sometimes, after restarting, you'll need to refresh the desktop. I used sorting the icons by name, and you'll see the change.