Windows 10 PIN and Fingerprint login are broken, Password login is missing
I encountered a Windows 10 login problem while trying to fix another problem. While I have been able to fix my login problem the solution was cumbersome. I was hoping the Windows Experts on EE might have some insight into a better way to resolve this issue, and why certain things that I tried did not work.
My other problem, which still hasn’t been resolved, is that when I click on “Run as administrator” in the context menu for a shortcut, nothing happens. I have a similar issue if use the Search on the task bar to search for Cmd and then click on “Run as administrator”. Perhaps a related issue is that the links to open a “New window” and “New incognito window” on the Chrome taskbar button don’t work either. There are many web pages with solutions to these two problems, which I am in the process of trying, so I will not re-ask about them here at EE unless I don’t find solutions that work. I only mention them since they are relatively new problems that coincide with my login problem, so might be related.
While trying one of these solutions, it recommended using MSConfig to stop all non-Microsoft services from running at bootup to see if one of the services was interfering with the Run as administrator context menu option. The page instructed me to “Hide all Microsoft services” on the Services tab of MSConfig, “Disable all” the ones that remained, and reboot. Instead of following the instructions to-the-letter I chose “Diagnostic startup” on the General tab and rebooted.
Keep in mind that my usual login is using a PIN, so after Windows rebooted I was presented with the error “Something happened and your PIN isn't available. Click to set up your PIN again.” Clicking on the provided link the first time just gave the same message. Clicking it a second time said you can’t reset the PIN without first downloading an (unspecified) application, and asked if you want to search for it. If you choose to not search then you are presented with the same unavailable PIN error message, and if you choose to do the search there doesn’t appear to be any searching taking place nor any feedback about a search success or failure, and then you get the same unavailable PIN error message.
Since the PIN wasn’t working, I wanted to sign in using my password. On the signin page my link for “Sign in options” used to have three options for Password, PIN or Fingerprint. In retrospect, I now realize that when Windows recommended that I turn on the option to “Require Windows Hello sign-in for Microsoft accounts” to increase my security, I inadvertently turned off the option to sign in using my MS Account password. So now I had only two options for signing in: Fingerprint and PIN. Choosing Fingerprint didn’t work, since Windows didn’t seem to react to scanning my finger, probably because the required service wasn’t running. Since none of the available options were working I couldn’t log in.
I decided to use safe mode to see if I could resolve my issue. I used shift-click on the Restart option available on the login screen to reboot into safe mode. I chose Startup Repair, which did not fix my login issue. I chose to Change Windows startup behaviour, and upon reboot was presented with a login screen (not the usual Windows login) which prompted me to select one of the two MS Accounts which were used in the past to log into Windows, followed by a prompt for my password. I then opened a Command Prompt in safe mode. I ran SFC which did a scan (100% without reporting any errors), but then claimed it couldn’t complete properly; I think it had an insufficient privileges error. I then tried to run DISM, but that program isn’t available in safe mode. I navigated to C:\Windows\System32 and tried to run it from there, and got an error like I couldn’t run it using the online parameter. I tried to run MSConfig, but found out I wasn’t an Administrator and couldn’t run it. Using SET, I found that I was logged in using System, even though I had provided the credentials for my (Admin) user to set up safe mode (albeit, the system rebooted between then and offering me the safe mode options). I also tried opening various Windows Setup forms for Users and Sign-in options, but couldn’t open them as a non-Administrator.
I then tried to Enable Safe Mode and Enable Safe Mode with networking, and was prevented from signing in because only the PIN and Fingerprint options were available, and neither worked.
I tried to use RDP to log in remotely, only to be told that my computer was off-line, probably because RDP doesn’t run in MSConfig Diagnostic mode.
My convoluted solution to this problem was to open a Command Prompt in Safe Mode, navigate to C:\Windows\System32, rename Utilman.exe to Utilman.exe.original, and copy Cmd.exe to Utilman.exe. Then, on the regular Windows login screen, I clicked on the “Ease of Access” icon on the bottom right, which opened a Cmd prompt. From there I started MSConfig. MSConfig issued a lack of sufficient resources error, but opened anyway. Surprisingly, Windows did not complain about a lack of permissions even though I wasn’t logged in. Using MSConfig I set the system back to Normal bootup, rebooted, and logged in using my PIN. I was able to rename the fake Utilman.exe to Utilman.exe.Copy of Cmd.exe. The system wouldn’t let me rename Utilman.exe.original back to Utilman.exe, but it did let me copy it. I then opened the Sign-in options in Windows Settings and turned off Require Windows Hello sign-in for Microsoft accounts.
As I stated in the outset, I wonder if there was an easier solution to this login issue. For example, it would be nice to know how to run MSConfig using the Safe Mode Command Prompt. I have not tried to run SFC and DISM from the Safe Mode Command Prompt after restoring all the services, but am I supposed to be able to run these two utilities in Safe Mode, and if so, I think that I need to use different parameters for DISM so it repairs the Windows image on the C: drive instead of the Safe Mode Windows on the X: drive? Another possible solution might have been to turn off the option to Require Windows Hello for sign-in using a registry hack from the Command Prompt in Safe Mode (assuming that I could run regedit, which I might not be able to as System user),
Also, I can’t imagine that Microsoft allows MSConfig to turn off a service that is essential to logging in, and that this service stays off even in Safe mode. Since I assume that many people use Microsoft Accounts and have turned on the option to Require Windows Hello for sign-in, they would also be stuck if they used MSConfig for a Diagnostic startup. This problem would be too common to be left unfixed, so I have to guess that there is something else in my Windows setup that caused my login problem. While I think it is unlikely, perhaps whatever caused my login problem also is causing my problem with being unable to use the context menu to run programs as an Administrator.
Any insights would be appreciated.
My other problem, which still hasn’t been resolved, is that when I click on “Run as administrator” in the context menu for a shortcut, nothing happens. I have a similar issue if use the Search on the task bar to search for Cmd and then click on “Run as administrator”. Perhaps a related issue is that the links to open a “New window” and “New incognito window” on the Chrome taskbar button don’t work either. There are many web pages with solutions to these two problems, which I am in the process of trying, so I will not re-ask about them here at EE unless I don’t find solutions that work. I only mention them since they are relatively new problems that coincide with my login problem, so might be related.
While trying one of these solutions, it recommended using MSConfig to stop all non-Microsoft services from running at bootup to see if one of the services was interfering with the Run as administrator context menu option. The page instructed me to “Hide all Microsoft services” on the Services tab of MSConfig, “Disable all” the ones that remained, and reboot. Instead of following the instructions to-the-letter I chose “Diagnostic startup” on the General tab and rebooted.
Keep in mind that my usual login is using a PIN, so after Windows rebooted I was presented with the error “Something happened and your PIN isn't available. Click to set up your PIN again.” Clicking on the provided link the first time just gave the same message. Clicking it a second time said you can’t reset the PIN without first downloading an (unspecified) application, and asked if you want to search for it. If you choose to not search then you are presented with the same unavailable PIN error message, and if you choose to do the search there doesn’t appear to be any searching taking place nor any feedback about a search success or failure, and then you get the same unavailable PIN error message.
Since the PIN wasn’t working, I wanted to sign in using my password. On the signin page my link for “Sign in options” used to have three options for Password, PIN or Fingerprint. In retrospect, I now realize that when Windows recommended that I turn on the option to “Require Windows Hello sign-in for Microsoft accounts” to increase my security, I inadvertently turned off the option to sign in using my MS Account password. So now I had only two options for signing in: Fingerprint and PIN. Choosing Fingerprint didn’t work, since Windows didn’t seem to react to scanning my finger, probably because the required service wasn’t running. Since none of the available options were working I couldn’t log in.
I decided to use safe mode to see if I could resolve my issue. I used shift-click on the Restart option available on the login screen to reboot into safe mode. I chose Startup Repair, which did not fix my login issue. I chose to Change Windows startup behaviour, and upon reboot was presented with a login screen (not the usual Windows login) which prompted me to select one of the two MS Accounts which were used in the past to log into Windows, followed by a prompt for my password. I then opened a Command Prompt in safe mode. I ran SFC which did a scan (100% without reporting any errors), but then claimed it couldn’t complete properly; I think it had an insufficient privileges error. I then tried to run DISM, but that program isn’t available in safe mode. I navigated to C:\Windows\System32 and tried to run it from there, and got an error like I couldn’t run it using the online parameter. I tried to run MSConfig, but found out I wasn’t an Administrator and couldn’t run it. Using SET, I found that I was logged in using System, even though I had provided the credentials for my (Admin) user to set up safe mode (albeit, the system rebooted between then and offering me the safe mode options). I also tried opening various Windows Setup forms for Users and Sign-in options, but couldn’t open them as a non-Administrator.
I then tried to Enable Safe Mode and Enable Safe Mode with networking, and was prevented from signing in because only the PIN and Fingerprint options were available, and neither worked.
I tried to use RDP to log in remotely, only to be told that my computer was off-line, probably because RDP doesn’t run in MSConfig Diagnostic mode.
My convoluted solution to this problem was to open a Command Prompt in Safe Mode, navigate to C:\Windows\System32, rename Utilman.exe to Utilman.exe.original, and copy Cmd.exe to Utilman.exe. Then, on the regular Windows login screen, I clicked on the “Ease of Access” icon on the bottom right, which opened a Cmd prompt. From there I started MSConfig. MSConfig issued a lack of sufficient resources error, but opened anyway. Surprisingly, Windows did not complain about a lack of permissions even though I wasn’t logged in. Using MSConfig I set the system back to Normal bootup, rebooted, and logged in using my PIN. I was able to rename the fake Utilman.exe to Utilman.exe.Copy of Cmd.exe. The system wouldn’t let me rename Utilman.exe.original back to Utilman.exe, but it did let me copy it. I then opened the Sign-in options in Windows Settings and turned off Require Windows Hello sign-in for Microsoft accounts.
As I stated in the outset, I wonder if there was an easier solution to this login issue. For example, it would be nice to know how to run MSConfig using the Safe Mode Command Prompt. I have not tried to run SFC and DISM from the Safe Mode Command Prompt after restoring all the services, but am I supposed to be able to run these two utilities in Safe Mode, and if so, I think that I need to use different parameters for DISM so it repairs the Windows image on the C: drive instead of the Safe Mode Windows on the X: drive? Another possible solution might have been to turn off the option to Require Windows Hello for sign-in using a registry hack from the Command Prompt in Safe Mode (assuming that I could run regedit, which I might not be able to as System user),
Also, I can’t imagine that Microsoft allows MSConfig to turn off a service that is essential to logging in, and that this service stays off even in Safe mode. Since I assume that many people use Microsoft Accounts and have turned on the option to Require Windows Hello for sign-in, they would also be stuck if they used MSConfig for a Diagnostic startup. This problem would be too common to be left unfixed, so I have to guess that there is something else in my Windows setup that caused my login problem. While I think it is unlikely, perhaps whatever caused my login problem also is causing my problem with being unable to use the context menu to run programs as an Administrator.
Any insights would be appreciated.
Last Comment
ASKER
Thanks for the response, Andrew.
My current state is:
My current state is:
- I am able to log in like I usually used to be able to log in, with either my PIN or my password (and probably my fingerprint, although I haven't tried). I have almost complete use of my system so I am not in urgent need of a fix.
- I assume that if I were to try to do a Diagnostic boot using MSConfig that I would again be unable to use my PIN or Fingerprint to log in to regular mode or safe mode. However, because I turned off the option to Require Windows Hello to sign-in, I will be able to log in using my password. I have not tested this.
- My first original problem persists. I am unable to use Run as administrator from the context menu.
- My second original problem persists. I am unable to open a browser window using the tasks presented in the context menu of the Chrome button on the Taskbar.
- I tested by logging in as another user who rarely logs in and she has the same issues with Run as administrator and Chrome. I notice that she also has most, if not all, of the extra shortcuts on her context menu as I have. I mention this, since many articles say that one of these extra context menu items can cause the problem. One of these extra items is from a program that I am assuming isn't widely installed, so is a likely candidate.
- I plan to read the articles you suggested and to see if SFC and DISM can fix my context menu issue.
- I will also read the articles to learn more about how to use these programs in safe mode.
- We're not at the worse case scenario, yet.
- First, I have a workaround for the Run as administrator in that I can edit the shortcut and set it to Run as administrator, which works.
- Second, there are many articles with suggestions for fixing my two issues, and I want to follow their suggestions before resorting to more drastic measures. Unfortunately, I know that following those suggestions will be time consuming since at first try I haven't found easy options in the settings for the programs to do so, so I will have to do some research on the respective developers help sites.
- I would like to keep this question on topic of how I could have better resolved my login issue, and on why some of the things that I tried in safe mode did not work. Like I stated first, I am not in urgent need for a fix. However, if I have one problem like this it is likely have have another, and I want to learn how to get out of them while I can still access my account! If I need more help with the Run as administrator or Chrome context menu issues, I will post a new question. I only mentioned those other problems in case they were related to the login problem; for example, because they all rely on the same service or authentication.
- If anything, this scare has prompted me to bring some of my recovery tools up-to-date. I expect you have probably written an article about this, so I will look for it :) If you haven't, then it's a good topic to cover. My thoughts aren't organized on this topic, but as I update my tools I will take some notes. I am thinking of tools like
- a password recovery disk
- a bootable CD or USB Drive with WindowsRE on it
- a bootable CD or USB with my backup program on it
- Dell provides some programs to make install and recovery disks. I need to run these.
- a list of assets (programs, drivers, documents, shortcuts, specs) which should be copied to an external drive so it can be accessed during a recovery, etc.)
- Again, this is a subject for another topic, so I will either add my comments about recovery tools below any existing article, or perhaps start a new question asking for any suggestions.
Hi Gary,
Thanks for that - much clearer as to where you are now and what needs attention.
I've encountered those problems on client machines over the years and recall needing to do a reinstall of Windows as a result to cure them. That, however, should not be needed with current builds, as when I last encountered and dealt with those probs, Windows 10 was still in its infancy and not widely used - many upgrades and builds released since then and lots more repair options available to you now.
Read the articles I linked by all means, but I'd suggest first doing the following to perhaps save yourself some time and also possibly cure the issues you've listed.
Step A) Open an administrator command prompt and run Chkdsk in read-only mode to see if it reports any problems. Also a SFC /scannow command. Allow it to complete.
Step B) The next thing I would recommend you do is run a DISM /RestoreHealth process as described in my article and then check if both of the above problems continue to exist.
Ie: In an administrator command prompt, issue the command: DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
Step C) If the problems persist, I would then do an in-place upgrade and non-destructive repair of Windows 10 - you will not lose any data. The process is described in this article.
Step D) Finally if the problems continue to persist (it would surprise me if they did) then I would also create a LOCAL (Not a Microsoft Online) administrator profile account and test if the problems persist in the Local account. Disregard any additional accounts you already have as they all may be affected.
Create a new Local Administrator Profile (described in this article) and test in that - BUT - only after you have completed performing steps A) and B) and C) above.
Do the problems persist in the new Local Administrator Profile?
Hope the above makes sense?
The above are not drastic steps and I assure you are all are quite safe to perform. I've done them *many* times personally on many different client's machines at a variety of companies I serviced and acted as system administrator for.
I'll address the rest of your comment in a separate comment so we can keep things separate from my recommending actions, to discussing alternatives.
Hope that's helpful.
Best regards,
Andrew
Thanks for that - much clearer as to where you are now and what needs attention.
- I assume that if I were to try to do a Diagnostic boot using MSConfig that I would again be unable to use my PIN or Fingerprint to log in to regular mode or safe mode. However, because I turned off the option to Require Windows Hello to sign-in, I will be able to log in using my password. I have not tested this.
- My first original problem persists. I am unable to use Run as administrator from the context menu.
- My second original problem persists. I am unable to open a browser window using the tasks presented in the context menu of the Chrome button on the Taskbar.
- I tested by logging in as another user who rarely logs in and she has the same issues with Run as administrator and Chrome. I notice that she also has most, if not all, of the extra shortcuts on her context menu as I have. I mention this, since many articles say that one of these extra context menu items can cause the problem. One of these extra items is from a program that I am assuming isn't widely installed, so is a likely candidate.
I've encountered those problems on client machines over the years and recall needing to do a reinstall of Windows as a result to cure them. That, however, should not be needed with current builds, as when I last encountered and dealt with those probs, Windows 10 was still in its infancy and not widely used - many upgrades and builds released since then and lots more repair options available to you now.
Read the articles I linked by all means, but I'd suggest first doing the following to perhaps save yourself some time and also possibly cure the issues you've listed.
Step A) Open an administrator command prompt and run Chkdsk in read-only mode to see if it reports any problems. Also a SFC /scannow command. Allow it to complete.
Step B) The next thing I would recommend you do is run a DISM /RestoreHealth process as described in my article and then check if both of the above problems continue to exist.
Ie: In an administrator command prompt, issue the command: DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
Step C) If the problems persist, I would then do an in-place upgrade and non-destructive repair of Windows 10 - you will not lose any data. The process is described in this article.
Step D) Finally if the problems continue to persist (it would surprise me if they did) then I would also create a LOCAL (Not a Microsoft Online) administrator profile account and test if the problems persist in the Local account. Disregard any additional accounts you already have as they all may be affected.
Create a new Local Administrator Profile (described in this article) and test in that - BUT - only after you have completed performing steps A) and B) and C) above.
Do the problems persist in the new Local Administrator Profile?
Hope the above makes sense?
The above are not drastic steps and I assure you are all are quite safe to perform. I've done them *many* times personally on many different client's machines at a variety of companies I serviced and acted as system administrator for.
I'll address the rest of your comment in a separate comment so we can keep things separate from my recommending actions, to discussing alternatives.
Hope that's helpful.
Best regards,
Andrew
Second, there are many articles with suggestions for fixing my two issues, and I want to follow their suggestions before resorting to more drastic measures. Unfortunately, I know that following those suggestions will be time consuming since at first try I haven't found easy options in the settings for the programs to do so, so I will have to do some research on the respective developers help sites.
Research by all means, but I'd still recommend going with what I suggested in the previous comment. Could save you a lot of time.
9. I would like to keep this question on topic of how I could have better resolved my login issue, and on why some of the things that I tried in safe mode did not work. Like I stated first, I am not in urgent need for a fix. However, if I have one problem like this it is likely have have another, and I want to learn how to get out of them while I can still access my account! If I need more help with the Run as administrator or Chrome context menu issues, I will post a new question. I only mentioned those other problems in case they were related to the login problem; for example, because they all rely on the same service or authentication.
The potential problem I see with that approach is that you may never find a definite cause as there could be more than one. I think it's best to first ensure your Windows 10 is as stable and has no corruptions that are causing your issues. Nailing down a specific cause for each problem may be impossible and quite unneeded (not to mention exceedingly time-consuming) if a Windows 10 repair or in-place upgrade repairs the problems. You will likely find yourself going around in circles. I'd recommend ensuring Windows 10 is healthy first as I described in my previous comment, and then concentrate on any leftover issues or problems that persist. You may find that all of them are corrected once you ensure Windows 10 is healthy again. See my point?
None of the suggestions I've given you should cause you to have any login problems again and once you have an image of your system, you can always restore back to where you started anyway. More on that in a moment.
All good ideas to do. I can wholeheartedly recommend the following program (Macrium Reflect Free) to create a restorable image of your system to an external USB Drive.
- If anything, this scare has prompted me to bring some of my recovery tools up-to-date. I expect you have probably written an article about this, so I will look for it :) If you haven't, then it's a good topic to cover. My thoughts aren't organized on this topic, but as I update my tools I will take some notes. I am thinking of tools like
- a password recovery disk
- a bootable CD or USB Drive with WindowsRE on it
- a bootable CD or USB with my backup program on it
- Dell provides some programs to make install and recovery disks. I need to run these.
- a list of assets (programs, drivers, documents, shortcuts, specs) which should be copied to an external drive so it can be accessed during a recovery, etc.)
- Again, this is a subject for another topic, so I will either add my comments about recovery tools below any existing article, or perhaps start a new question asking for any suggestions.
Though I currently subscribe to an Acronis Backup solution, I have used the above on many systems myself in the past and also used it to successfully restore entire operating systems and programs when computers refused to even boot past DOS to a Windows login screen. I also have clients that use the paid version of the product and have been very happy with it.
You will also only need the free version to do what you need to in order to protect yourself from any unrecoverable disaster. The paid version is more if you want to set it up to do scheduled images periodically and automatically. There are no restrictions on what you can do with the free version of the program manually.
Hope that's helpful.
Regards, Andrew
Gary,
I linked the wrong article for you to read earlier. I meant to link this one for you.
That's the Non-Destructive in-place repair/upgrade of Windows 10 I was talking about in previous comments. (I've now corrected my previous comments)
Apologies if I caused you any confusion. Can't seem to keep track of my own articles lol :)
Cheers, Andrew
P.S.. In any article I write, I document the entire process while I'm doing it, so all of my articles are not from research, but always from personal experience unless otherwise stated.
I linked the wrong article for you to read earlier. I meant to link this one for you.
Apologies if I caused you any confusion. Can't seem to keep track of my own articles lol :)
Cheers, Andrew
P.S.. In any article I write, I document the entire process while I'm doing it, so all of my articles are not from research, but always from personal experience unless otherwise stated.
Gary,
One final thought I had with regards to your Chrome issue when I re-read your last comment. Though I don't believe the problem of starting Chrome from the taskbar has anything to do with the Chrome browser itself, you might also like to bookmark the following article I've written if you are encountering problems with Chrome itself, or perhaps encounter any in the future that you can't resolve.
I have PMs and Emails from many people who thanked me for it and advised the process I described helped them when nothing else would. Just thought I'd throw it in the mix given that you mentioned Google Chrome specifically.
Best, Andrew
One final thought I had with regards to your Chrome issue when I re-read your last comment. Though I don't believe the problem of starting Chrome from the taskbar has anything to do with the Chrome browser itself, you might also like to bookmark the following article I've written if you are encountering problems with Chrome itself, or perhaps encounter any in the future that you can't resolve.
I have PMs and Emails from many people who thanked me for it and advised the process I described helped them when nothing else would. Just thought I'd throw it in the mix given that you mentioned Google Chrome specifically.
Best, Andrew
When dealing with access, you must always operate in safe-mode.
defender is there to shield the system and this method is known to defender.
Not sure whichi service you mean. Safe-mode loads the bare-essentials without network, adds options if network is included.
defender is there to shield the system and this method is known to defender.
Not sure whichi service you mean. Safe-mode loads the bare-essentials without network, adds options if network is included.
ASKER
Thanks, Andrew, for your detailed and thorough comments. I don't have time to try everything today, so don't think that a lack of feedback means that your solutions haven't helped. I have tried a few things, with the following results.
- I ran Chckdsk in read only mode and it found no problems on my C: drive.
- I ran SFC /scannow from the Administrator Command Prompt. It made repairs, and from what I could see in the log file the repairs were to incorrect ownerships of folders and it restored a link to onedrive. It did not fix either Run as administrator or the Chrome Tasks, but I now have a new issue in that there is a big gap between the tasks and the three options at the bottom of the menu.
- I ran DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth. Surprisingly, the Cleanup-Image isn't documented in the help for the command. The command completed successfully and there was no mention of errors. It did not fix either of my context menu issues.
- I read through your article about doing a non-destructive repair of Windows, and see that it will take more time than I have available right now to pursue this problem.
- I didn't mention this before, but I previously tried disabling my Norton LifeLock to see if that would fix the issues, and it did not. I tried it again with the same non-results.
- I used Change User Account Control settings to turn off UAC, and then turn it back to its previous setting one from the top. No joy.
- EUREKA! I removed Express Zip (by NCH Software) from my context menu and that fixed both my Run as administrator and Chrome Tasks issues. I still have the big gap on my Chrome menu, but I hope that unpinning it and pinning it back might fix it. (I can't do that now since I am using Chrome to write this comment.) I temporarily re-added Express Zip to my context menu, and the problems returned. I removed it again and the problems were fixed again. I will report the issue to NCH.
- To set appropriate expectations, I probably won't be able to resume on this issue until the end of June since I have higher priority deadlines before then. I will probably also pursue the Emergency Tools, but as a separate thread.
- I will leave this question open in case any other experts have ideas not already covered by Andrew. As a reminder, the objective of this ticket was to determine why my login wasn't working in debugging mode, and to give me more insight about Safe mode. Fixing the context menus was a bonus.
ASKER
I don't want to give NCH's Express Zip a bad name, so subsequent to determining that it was the source of my context menu issues I updated the program from version 6.33 (circa December 2019) to version 8.10 (circa May 2021). The new version of the program does not interfere with the context menus, and the gap in the Chrome context menu is now also gone.
In fairness to Express Zip, that program has been installed for over a year and didn't cause any problems until about half a year ago, when I noticed that the Tasks on my Chrome menu no longer worked. I suspect that the issue was caused by an update in Windows that interfered with Express Zip, and NCH reacted by fixing the issue. Because I don't actually use the program (it's a trial version that was installed with one of their other excellent audio and video editing programs) I never got the notification that it was updated.
In fairness to Express Zip, that program has been installed for over a year and didn't cause any problems until about half a year ago, when I noticed that the Tasks on my Chrome menu no longer worked. I suspect that the issue was caused by an update in Windows that interfered with Express Zip, and NCH reacted by fixing the issue. Because I don't actually use the program (it's a trial version that was installed with one of their other excellent audio and video editing programs) I never got the notification that it was updated.
Interesting Gary, I'd never considered a context menu item existing from a third-party program to be the cause of such a problem. Nice pickup.
Regards, Andrew
Regards, Andrew
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Quite a detailed explanation of what you went through and did. The fact that Windows was appearing on an X drive is quite normal under some alternate troubleshooting boot configurations and is not a concern. I explain that a bit in my article Repair Windows 10 issues safely using the Built-In DISM Command that I recommend you read through, as well as how to run DISM successfully when you don't have online access in a boot scenario.
From everything I've read, I see these possible causes that could be related (and contributing) to the problems you're having and had.
1. A windows user profile corruption.
2. A protect Windows system file missing or corrupted.
3. File system has been compromised.
4. Possible hardware (HDD) issues.
Can you clarify exactly where you are right now?
1. Are you able to log in to your Microsoft Online account profile on Windows 10?
2. Which problems are still persisting - it's not clear from your question.
If you could clarify exactly and list what the state of your machine is, and which problems still need to be resolved and in what order, that will give us a starting point. Try breaking it up into chunks.
In the meantime, from the information I've been able to gather, the first thing I would do is urge you to do an online DISM repair as described in my DISM article. (Backup first)
However, if you have a profile corruption, DISM will not resolve it, so I would then also suggest creating a new profile as described in my article here: Create a new Microsoft Account User Profile in Windows 10 and then test to see which problems continue to exist, or cease to be problematic. My latest article on regular Windows Maintenance may also help by following the steps in there.
In a worst-case scenario where none of the above options help, an in-place upgrade and non-destructive repair of Windows 10 as described in this article can often repair issues other methods can't, thus avoiding a complete wipe and reinstall of Windows.
Non Destructive Repair of Windows 10 - Answers to commonly asked questions
That's a lot of reading and different suggestions, so I would be happy to work through this with you one step at a time if you like.
Please let me know how you would best like to proceed and I'll be happy to help.
Regards, Andrew