Windows 10: Cortana process is missing, no search available

Hi, glad it works. Sometimes when you have not much installed and it's not much extra work to clean install, that is the quickest way.

Unless you use disk imaging- which we strongly recommend. Here's how to consolidate your working state, and recover it quickly without technical help:
Creating disk images lets you restore Windows and all your disks and partitions to a previous working state, quickly and probably without technical help.

You can recover from:
- a failed disk drive (restore to a new one)
- ransomware (which encrypts your disk)
- user error
- unrecoverable problems from failed updates to problem programs
- unbootable PC (hardware faults aside)

Images also act as a full backup- you can extract files too.

You can even use images to help you move more easily and quickly to a new PC.

Imaging can even help you sleep at night knowing you have a second chance.

Many here recommend Macrium Reflect (free) as a good robust solution and more reliable than some others. It’s
- more feature rich
- more flexible
- more reliable
than Windows Backup and Restore system images.

It's well supported with videos, help and a responsive forum.

There are other such programs, free/commercial, some with simpler interfaces, but Macrium R is one of the most robust and reliable.

How long does it take?
SSD+ USB3 - maybe 15 mins for the first system image, less thereafter
HDD + USB2 - maybe 40-50 mins
That’s with little personal data, few programs installed.
- of course, depends how much you have on C:
(You can and should image all your partitions and disks)

Once you've created your first image, keep it updated with e.g. differential imaging- which images just changes from the first image, more quickly, and creates a smaller image file.