Windows 10: Start menu not working, nor search bar, jump lists, clock, etc

Hello,

I have had this machine for a month or so now, and did a clean install of Win10 when I got it. All has been fine until today.

I just came back from holiday (not sure if this has any relevance at all, but added it in case), and swapped my keyboard from a dual-language one I got on holiday. Powered up and all seemed fine. I decided I didn't like the new keyboard, so unplugged it and plugged my old one back in. I now have a multitude of problems...

• If I click the Windows button in the bottom-left corner of the screen, nothing happens. I can right-click it and get the context menu, but if I left click, nothing happens
• If I right-click any pinned icon on my task bar, nothing happens. I don't get a jump list (I had several items pinned to jump lists before I went away), nor do I get the usual context menu.
• If I click in the search bar ("Ask me anything"), nothing happens. If I type, nothing is entered in the bar. Same if I click the Windows key on my keyboard.
• If I click the date/time on the very right hand end of the task bar, nothing happens. I don't get the calendar pop up as I used to.
• Various other things don't work as they did, but you get the idea by now

As you can imagine, this makes the PC pretty unusable. I don't know if swapping the keyboard had anything to do with it, as I can type without problem. Also, some of the problems appear to be mouse-related, such as the lack of response when right-clicking pinned icons.

I checked Windows Updates, and it hasn't installed any since the 15th Aug, which was just before we went away. There are updates available, but I haven't installed any of them yet.

I've rebooted the machine several times, but it hasn't made any difference.

Anyone any ideas? I'm struggling to do basic tasks here, as I don't have access to the Start menu, I have to fiddle around to get at Settings and so on.

Thanks for any help you can provide.

:)

 

Jump lists not working in start menu - Windows 10

Here is the solution that worked for me, found on another thread somewhere. Jump lists have been working for several days now.

1. Open Powershell with admin privileges

(Click the search bar and type powershell, then go up to the top of the menu and RIGHT click "Windows Powershell". Click "Run as administrator")

2. Copy and paste this line at the PS prompt:

Get-AppXPackage -AllUsers | Foreach {Add-AppxPackage -DisableDevelopmentMode -Register "$($_.InstallLocation)\AppXManifest.xml"}

You might have to wait a second for it to appear, when it does hit enter and wait until the prompt returns from PS

 

Jump lists not working in start menu - Windows 10

When I click an arrow to open the jump lists on app, or even for file explorer, when I left-click on the arrow nothing happens.

If I right-click, it gives me the correct options as it should but left-clicking on the arrows to view recently opened items does nothing.

Please can you provide a fix to this error.

Note: It was functioning correctly yesterday. In addition, I have clicked the option so that Jump Lists are enabled.

 

Hi, frustrating.

First easy options:
1. Do you have any useable System Restore points? (Note: SR is off by default.. so unless you turned it on, you won't have).
2. Do you use disk imaging yet.. or have you previously created a system image (Windows Backup and Restore)?

Then.. have you tried uninstalling the keyboard driver and restarting?
(And check Device Manager for any yellow triangles).

 

Ah, system restore did it! I didn't know that MS had disabled it in Win10, but for some reason, it was enabled on my machine. I restored back to a previous point and it all works fine now.

Thanks very much

 

Phew! That's fortunate..

 

Just restarted my machine, and it's happened again.

Any other ideas? Apart from any Windows updates that may have come in over the last day or so, I haven't done anything to the machine. Was working fine after the restore, but has now stopped working again.

Not that I really want to keep doing it, but the option of restoring the system isn't available, as Windows has helpfully cleaned out my restore points!

Help!

 

1. Try a new user account for test purposes. If not present, it's user account corruption or 3rd part program conflict.

2. Try existing user in
a. clean boot
b. safe mode

Report all 3 separately
1, 2a, 2b.

 

Hello,

Thanks for the reply. I tried creating a new account, but when I click the "Add a family member" or "Add someone else to this PC" buttons in the Accounts settings section, I get a grey square flash on the screen for a second or so, which then disappears. That's it. It looks like this too is broken. I can't see any way to add a new user.

I've already tried safe mode, and it didn't make any difference. Not sure what you mean by "clean boot" though.

Any ideas? Thanks again. I'm starting to contemplate scrubbing the entire disk and going back to Windows 7. I never had this sort of problem in all the years I used it. I'd really like to avoid that if I can though, as it's going to take a few full days to reinstall and reconfigure everything.

 

See...

https://www.tenforums.com/tutorials/4...conflicts.html

 

Thanks for the link. Can't try it now as I tried updating again, and there was one more update to come (didn't look very hopeful, but I thought I'd try it anyway). Restarted the machine after updating, and it's been shutting down for about 25 minutes now (I'm using my lap top).

Do you think I should leave it, or should I physically shut down the machine with the power button and try again. Seems an awfully long time to shut down.

Thanks again.

 

Now you've started, just leave it. It could be disastrous to power down.

 

Yeah, that's what I thought. Just a pain to sit and watch it seemingly doing nothing. I work for myself, and this is my prime working time. I can see the time ticking away whilst my clients try to get hold of me, and I'm not getting paid for working.

Ho hum. Don'tcha just LURVE computers sometimes?

How long do I leave it? What happens if it sits there for another hour? Can't believe it can take that long to install one update.

 

Assuming you mean you started upgrading again, with updates, then it will take as long as it takes to download 3Gb + xGb and do a Windows installation and transfer your data, registry etc, and apply updates. - well, as far as it gets. So internet speed, how fast your disk is.. reckon a 1-2 hours on an HDD I suppose...

I only ever upgrade with physical media (so I can repeat without re-downloading, and have the medium to boot from for recovery, or for in-place upgrade repair installation) and then apply updates).

However, for some, the anniversary upgrade will not really allow that, as there will be subsequent patches to fix e.g. loss of partitions, freezing... depends how they deliver the upgrade as time goes by of course.

 

Ran Windows Update, allowed it to download the update, clicked the desktop, pressed Alt-f4 and choose "Update and shut down"

As far as I could see, it had already downloaded the single update. Even if not, I have optical broadband, so downloading even a few gigs doesn't usually take that long. Apart from which, I think it's well past that stage. I've got the green screen ('cos that's the theme colour I chose) with the little whirling icon and the message "Shutting down." From what I've seen in the past, that only happens after all downloads are complete.

Again, for one update, it seems to be taking a heck of a long time. When I started up on Sunday, it did about 30 updates, and it was all over in a few minutes.

Got an SSD, so disk access is usually superfast.

Ho hum, not much I can do except for sit and wait. Just very frustrating, especially as I have zero confidence that this will even solve the problem. Can't remember what the update was, but it wasn't anything that looked very likely. I think it was an Office update or similar, which is hardly likely to affect basic Windows operations like the start button or search bar.

Thanks anyway, looks like I'm in for some more thumb-twiddling.