To extract an icon from a file, use .NET Framework methods. Here is a sample that extracts all icons from all exe files in your Windows folder (or one of its subfolders) and puts them into a separate folder:
[System.Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName('System.Drawing') | Out-Null $folder = "$env:temp\icons" md $folder -ea 0 | Out-Null dir $env:windir *.exe -ea 0 -rec | ForEach-Object { $baseName = [System.IO.Path]::GetFileNameWithoutExtension($_.FullName) Write-Progress "Extracting Icon" $baseName [System.Drawing.Icon]::ExtractAssociatedIcon($_.FullName).ToBitmap().Save("$folder\$BaseName.ico") }