diff --git a/resources/images/blank-1x1.png b/resources/images/blank-1x1.png
deleted file mode 100644
index 91a99b94e2..0000000000
Binary files a/resources/images/blank-1x1.png and /dev/null differ
diff --git a/src/calibre/gui2/comments_editor.py b/src/calibre/gui2/comments_editor.py
index 34db3b65a4..79e9476f44 100644
--- a/src/calibre/gui2/comments_editor.py
+++ b/src/calibre/gui2/comments_editor.py
@@ -764,7 +764,12 @@ class EditorWidget(QTextEdit, LineEditECM):  # {{{
                     with lopen(path, 'rb') as f:
                         data = f.read()
                 except EnvironmentError:
-                    return QByteArray(I('blank-1x1.png', data=True))
+                return QByteArray(bytearray.fromhex(
+                                  '89504e470d0a1a0a0000000d49484452'
+                                  '000000010000000108060000001f15c4'
+                                  '890000000a49444154789c6300010000'
+                                  '0500010d0a2db40000000049454e44ae'
+                                  '426082'))
                 else:
                     return QByteArray(data)
 
diff --git a/src/calibre/gui2/widgets2.py b/src/calibre/gui2/widgets2.py
index 5aa6c9df59..9a02f188c4 100644
--- a/src/calibre/gui2/widgets2.py
+++ b/src/calibre/gui2/widgets2.py
@@ -489,7 +489,12 @@ class HTMLDisplay(QTextBrowser):
                 with lopen(path, 'rb') as f:
                     data = f.read()
             except EnvironmentError:
-                return QByteArray(I('blank-1x1.png', data=True))
+                return QByteArray(bytearray.fromhex(
+                      '89504e470d0a1a0a0000000d49484452'
+                      '000000010000000108060000001f15c4'
+                      '890000000a49444154789c6300010000'
+                      '0500010d0a2db40000000049454e44ae'
+                      '426082'))
             else:
                 return QByteArray(data)
         else: