Windows 10: When I used the offline scan on my laptop, it restarted then when it opened again I had...

I restarted my computer because the cpu was high for doing normal things, didn’t work so I thought I might use the Microsoft defender antivirus scanner. It restarted then asked for a key in which I don’t have nor do I have linked to my account. So I skipped it, then when I got back into using my laptop, everything in my documents had been deleted. Almost everything on my laptop was gone and it said I had no storage in documents anymore. Can I get my documents back?

:)

 

offline scan by win defender

Hi,

To further assist you with your concern with Windows Defender, follow the steps below:

• Open the Run window by pressing Window + R button.
• Then type services.msc and hit "Enter".
  
• Look for Windows defender service in the list and right click on it and select start.
• Once Windows defender is opened try to do the offline scan on that window.

Let us know how it goes.

 

Defender Periodic Scanning or Offline Scanning?

That link does suggest it's useful to use Defender offline scanning in addition to periodic scanning and a third party real time anti virus (e.g. Kaspersky).

 

Unable to start Windows Defender offline scan

When attempting to start an offline scan in Windows Defender, the following happens:

• I am prompted to save my work and warned this will restart my computer
• I click "Scan"
• The advanced scans window is shown, with "Time elapsed:__" and "__ files scanned" left blank. As well as an empty grey progress bar.

The computer does not restart, even if waiting the suggested 15 minutes. Nothing happens. How can I fix this?

(I've seen there are one or two other threads related to this topic, but I didn't see any actual resolution and the comments seem to have dried up)

Version: Windows 10 (1709)