Windows 10: Search window does not appear after last night's update

Hi

Not long time ago I upgraded to build 1607. Search window was working as expected.

This morning I noticed that my computer was restarted without any previous notice and apparently there were some updates. One of them failed to be installed so I re-installed it. Even before this, I noticed that the search window does not show when I click the magnifying glass. I was hoping that after installing the failed one and restarting my computer it will work but I guessed wrong.

What did happen was that when pressing the windows icon to open the start menu, I got a popup saying there was a problem and Windows will try to fix it in the next sign in, this window forced my to sign out and I did. I had to do it 3 times! to make the windows icon to work and now it does. The search button is still not working.

As I wrote the above, I now noticed that suddenly the start menu is dimmed! and not responding to my clicks, it was working OK until few moments ago.

I tried several fixes I read on the net, including the registry changes but that didn't help. Moreover, after doing so I had to sign out and sign in 3 times to make the start menu works again. I have neither search nor cortana in the task manager so I can't end them for windows to force restart so I'm out of options.

In windows settings, when I search for "search", the menu shows me "Cortana and search setting" but when clicking it, nothing happens. With other options like "windows update" for example, I get to the relevant window. Something is really messed up with my search/cortana.

Any help will be appreciated
Thanks!

edit: After posting the above, the start menu is back to normal.... the search window is still not there

:)

 

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Hi Virginia, I appreciate your help!

The error message does not specify which program is the problem. Last night I ran malware software I downloaded from the Microsoft community and I have no malware. Windows Defender is enabled and my anti-virus software (Windows) is up-to-date. It's curious
this error message just appeared after Microsoft sent the large update last week.

Thanks for your input.

 

After posting the above, the start menu is back to normal.... the search window is still not there

 

The correct behaviour when you do that is that Cortana/Search should pop up at its 'Settings' view - just as it would if you could find Search and click its 'settings' cogwheel.

First right-click on an empty part of the taskbar and try changing the 'Cortana>Hidden, Show icon, show search box' settings a few times. If that fails (as it probably will) maybe the Windows Search service isn't running. Try the Search and Indexing Troubleshooter in Control Panel\All Control Panel Items\Troubleshooting\System and Security

Sounds like you may have more problems besides the missing 'search' - you could also try sfc /scannow and see if that can fix them.

 

Thank you for your reply.

sfc /scannow found no problem
troubleshooting of search didn't have my problem listed so I entered it manually but again it didn't find anything.

I did disabled windows search service long time ago because it had a high disk usage. The search was working fine until last night's update. I ran the windows search service but that didn't do anything though I didn't restart my computer and yet again, this service was disabled long time ago.

 

The question went to the next pages very quickly, any kind of help will be appreciated
Thanks