Cortana, Start Menu, Personalize Desktop, Desktop Settings and more BROKEN

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For over a month now, Cortana has not accepted me typing anything in it. Though this was annoying as anything, I could tolerate it so long as the Start Menu was available.

Well. The computer locked up after it telling me it would reboot in 'down hours' and me not being able to get Settings to come up to see when the PC thought this was. Well--after several bad reboots -- 3 of which never finished and the last taking over 30 minutes, it HOSED my desktop to the extreme and now the following don't work:
Cortana
Start Menu
Right-Click: Personalize
Right-Click: Display Settings
Settings

I tried the 'Troubleshooter' thing and all it tells me is that something isn't installed correctly (with NO further details available) and that's it.

Since it installed itself Windows 10 has repeatedly hosed my computer like this. It also ignores my 'don't install any updates without explicit permission' and installs stuff anyway.
 
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Any suggestions to help would be appreciated.

Also, as I sit here, the desktop keeps going blank for several seconds then returning .
 

Bif

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Sounds like explorer is crashing and restarting by your description of the desktop going blank and then returning, this could also be causing your Cortana issue as well...
Try running a System File Check and see if that finds and or repairs any funky files.
Aside from that I will defer to the wiser ones on here as I have never used Cortana and have had her disabled from the moment I upgraded.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-ca...a40be/using-system-file-checker-in-windows-10
 
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Unfortunately, due to the issues, I can't even GET to the system file checker as the start menu is totally broken (clicking/right-clicking--NOTHING works.)

Only reason I had Cortana enabled was to find where the heck Windows 10 was hiding all the useful things like Control Panel
 

Trouble

Noob Whisperer
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Go to
C:\Windows\System32
Find
Cmd.exe (IF you are hiding file extensions of known types, then it might just say cmd and not cmd.exe)
Right click it and choose run as administrator
At the admin command prompt type
SFC /scannow
hit enter and see what it produces.
 

Trouble

Noob Whisperer
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Have you considered creating a new local user as a member of the local administrators groups and testing with that log in, just to see if there is an issue with your current user profile?
Go to
C:\Windows\System32
Find
Cmd.exe
Right click it and choose run as administrator
At the admin command prompt type
net user JohnSmith /add
hit enter
then type
net localgroup administrators JohnSmith /add
hit enter
type
exit
hit enter
Restart and log in as JohnSmith

Obviously, you don't have to use "JohnSmith", it's a temporary account for testing purposes and can be almost anything (Tom, Dick or Harry).
 
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Other user things seem to be working fine, but, of course, I can't get to my things (things like bookmarks are, of course, stuck per user). So now what do I do to fix this one?

In other news, part of the reason a lot of my stuff is smegged up is it ate my AppData

Thank you, by the way, for putting up with me. These issues, on top of other things, have pushed me past my breaking point into FrazzledMegaB
 
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Trouble

Noob Whisperer
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As far as "my things"......
You've already created a new profile
Now you need to enable the hidden Administrator account as you will need a third profile to move your old stuff to your new stuff.
You must have at least three user accounts on the computer to complete these steps, including the new account you just created.
SOURCE: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/14039/windows-7-fix-corrupted-user-profile
That's for Windows 7 but the basic principal still applies, so you can semi-use it as a guide.
Just stay away from anything that starts with "NT" as those particular items probably contain the corruption that is causing your issue.
Typically I just open two explorer windows and copy the contents of Desktop, Documents Downloads, Favorites, Music, etc., etc.
From the old profile to the new profile.
 

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