Troubleshoot Start menu errors

Start failures can be organized into these categories:

• Deployment/Install issues — Easiest to identify but difficult to recover. This failure is consistent and usually permanent. Reset, restore from backup, or rollback to recover.
• Performance issues — More common with older hardware, low-powered machines. Symptoms include: High CPU utilization, disk contention, memory resources. This makes Start very slow to respond. Behavior is intermittent depending on available resources.
• Crashes — Also easy to identify. Crashes in Shell Experience Host or related can be found in System or Application event logs. This can be a code defect or related to missing or altered permissions to files or registry keys by a program or incorrect security tightening configurations. Determining permissions issues can be time consuming but a SysInternals tool called Procmon will show Access Denied. The other option is to get a dump of the process when it crashes and depending on comfort level, review the dump in the debugger, or have support review the data.
• Hangs — in Shell Experience host or related. These are the hardest issues to identify as there are few events logged, but behavior is typically intermittent or recovers with a reboot. If a background application or service hangs, Start will not have resources to respond in time. Clean boot may help identify if the issue is related to additional software. Procmon is also useful in this scenario.
• Other issues — Customization, domain policies, deployment issues.

Basic troubleshooting

When troubleshooting basic Start issues (and for the most part, all other Windows apps), there are a few things to check if they are not working as expected. For issues where the Start menu or subcomponent isn’t working, you can do some quick tests to narrow down where the issue may reside.

Check the OS and update version

• Is the system running the latest Feature and Cumulative Monthly update?
• Did the issue start immediately after an update? Ways to check:
  • PowerShell:[System.Environment]::OSVersion.Version
  • WinVer from CMD.exe

Check if Start is installed

If Start fails immediately after a feature update, on thing to check is if the App package failed to install successfully.

If Start was working and just fails intermittently, it’s likely that Start is installed correctly, but the issue occurs downstream. The way to check for this problem is to look for output from these two PS commands:

get-AppXPackage -Name Microsoft.Windows.ShellExperienceHost

get-AppXPackage -Name Microsoft.Windows.Cortana

Failure messages will appear if they aren’t installed

If Start is not installed, then the fastest resolution is to revert to a known good configuration. This can be rolling back the update, resetting the PC to defaults (where there is a choice to save to delete user data), or restoring from backup. No method is supported to install Start Appx files. The results are often problematic and unreliable.

Check if Start is running

If either component is failing to start on boot, reviewing the event logs for errors or crashes during boot may pin point the problem. Booting with MSCONFIG and using a selective or diagnostic startup option will eliminate and/or identify possible interference from additional applications.

• get-process -name shellexperiencehost
• get-process -name searchui

If it is installed but not running, test booting into safe mode or use MSCONFIG to eliminate third-party or additional drivers and applications.

Check whether the system a clean install or upgrade

• Is this system an upgrade or clean install?
  • Run test-path «$env:windir\panther\miglog.xml»
  • If that file does not exist, the system is a clean install.
• Upgrade issues can be found by running test-path «$env:windir\panther\miglog.xml»

Check if Start is registered or activated

• Export the following Event log to CSV and do a keyword search in a text editor or spreadsheet:
  • Microsoft-Windows-TWinUI/Operational for Microsoft.Windows.ShellExperienceHost or Microsoft.Windows.Cortana
    • «Package was not found»
    • «Invalid value for registry»
    • «Element not found»
    • «Package could not be registered»

If these events are found, Start is not activated correctly. Each event will have more detail in the description and should be investigated further. Event messages can vary.

Other things to consider

When did the problem start?

• Top issues for Start menu failure are triggered
  • After an update
  • After installation of an application
  • After joining a domain or applying a domain policy
• Many of those issues are found to be
  • Permission changes on Registry keys or folders
  • Start or related component crashes or hangs
  • Customization failure

To narrow down the problem further, it’s good to note:

What is the install background?

• Was this a deployment, install from media, other
• Using customizations?
  • DISM
  • Group Policy or MDM
  • copyprofile
  • Sysprep
  • Other

• Group policy settings that restrict access or permissions to folders or registry keys can cause issues with Start performance.
• Some Group Policies intended for Windows 7 or older have been known to cause issues with Start
• Untested Start Menu customizations can cause unexpected behavior by typically not complete Start failures.

Windows all user start menu

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Question

I’m writing some scripts that help with all of our post-domain-join server builds (we build a LOT of servers)

Part of the script will have to create a shortcut to a batch file that runs BGInfo when the user logs in.

How can I find the allusers startup folder?

I know on W7/2008 it’s here:

and on 2003 it’s

C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs\Startup

Is there a safer way to find it, by means of an environment variable or some fancy .net trick?

Answers

I need something a little more «universal»

Here’s what I did.

All replies

[Environment] :: GetFolderPath ( ‘CommonStartup’ )

Looks like maybe there isn’t a CommonStartup?

Here’s an error with some details. (Wow! an error with detailed information!)

Cannot convert argument «0», with value: «CommonStartup», for «GetFolderPath» to type «System.Environment+SpecialFolder»: «Cannot convert value «CommonStart

up» to type «System.Environment+SpecialFolder» due to invalid enumeration values. Specify one of the following enumeration values and try again. The possibl

e enumeration values are «Desktop, Programs, Personal, MyDocuments, Favorites, Startup, Recent, SendTo, StartMenu, MyMusic, DesktopDirectory, MyComputer, Te

mplates, ApplicationData, LocalApplicationData, InternetCache, Cookies, History, CommonApplicationData, System, ProgramFiles, MyPictures, CommonProgramFiles

How to customize Default Users Profile Start Menu in Windows 10?

I’d like to set up a customized Start Menu, with IE 11, Outlook and the company’s most common line of business apps having tiles added at the top and also remove the other tiles Microsoft adds to the Start Menu by default.

I know there is GPO you can use to deploy a customized Start Menu, but it is unacceptable because it does not allow users to add additional tiles and shortcuts or rearrange existing tiles.

I do not want the «Start Screen Layout» GPO that locks the Start Menu into a permanent layout.

How can you customize the Start Menu on Windows 10 so it only affects the Default User profile so that each new user profile gets the work optimized Start Menu automatically, but the users are not prevented from adding their own tiles ?

I got further by naming the file layoutmodification.xml and placing it in the Default user profile, but now the spot were IE was in the original profile came up blank.

Still don’t know why «Most used» already has items in it.

14 Replies

IE 11 is completely gone from Win10; only Edge remains as a browser.

Most of the Win7 GPOs will work in Win10. Once you try a GPO, post back here if it didn’t work.

I used Powershell and export-layout and import-layout. I can try to look it up more when I’m at my desk later, but basically you come up with the layout you want, export it to a .bin file, and then import it to the default profile. I used it to provide a pretty blank layout. Since I removed provisioned apps from my .wim the menu was a bit of a mess without some cleaning.

Oh, and IE11 is definitely still there, though hidden in the start menu.

IE 11 is completely gone from Win10; only Edge remains as a browser.

Most of the Win7 GPOs will work in Win10. Once you try a GPO, post back here if it didn’t work.

Just a note here.. Windows 10 includes IE11 — its just a little hidden. START>>All Apps>>Windows Accessories>>IE11 (or just type Internet Explorer 11 in Cortana search)

Also you can view how to Customize Windows 10 Start with Group Policy on TechNet for details on how to.

Okay, so now that I’m looking at things, what I did was export the layout using Powershell as I mentioned above, to a .xml file. Then, in the GPO attached to my MDT OU (this is where MDT joins machines so it avoids settings that mess up the task sequence), I copied the .xml file to C:\Users\Default\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\DefaultLayouts.xml.

As I said, mine is very basic, I only changed it to keep the layout looking sane with all the provisioned apps removed, but here’s a look at the XML:

To test before trying to do it during an OS deployment, I customized the Administrator account Start Menu, exported the defaultlayouts.xml file and copied it into the Default user’s profile, but it didn’t work as expected.

I deleted the local user profiles and then logged in as a new user account. It added «Settings» to the Start Menu instead of the items I specified. It also has items under «Most used» despite this being a new profile.

Is there any reason why Microsoft made it where CopyProfile doesn’t simply do this? Why the need for all the extra stuff, when CopyProfile could take care of it?

I got further by naming the file layoutmodification.xml and placing it in the Default user profile, but now the spot were IE was in the original profile came up blank.

Still don’t know why «Most used» already has items in it.

Mine did add Settings, but it didn’t bother me since I wasn’t adding anything else myself.

IE 11 is completely gone from Win10; only Edge remains as a browser.

Most of the Win7 GPOs will work in Win10. Once you try a GPO, post back here if it didn’t work.

Just a note here.. Windows 10 includes IE11 — its just a little hidden. START>>All Apps>>Windows Accessories>>IE11 (or just type Internet Explorer 11 in Cortana search)

Also you can view how to Customize Windows 10 Start with Group Policy on TechNet for details on how to.

Dang. I couldn’t find it 2 weeks ago. 😛

I decided to just copy the IE shortcut into the Default users desktop as a workaround and the user can do what they want with it after logging in. They can keep the shortcut, move it to the taskbar, make a tile or delete it and use Search, but they won’t need to call saying they can’t find IE.

To test before trying to do it during an OS deployment, I customized the Administrator account Start Menu, exported the defaultlayouts.xml file and copied it into the Default user’s profile, but it didn’t work as expected.

I deleted the local user profiles and then logged in as a new user account. It added «Settings» to the Start Menu instead of the items I specified. It also has items under «Most used» despite this being a new profile.

Notice that your .xml starts with LayoutModificationTemplate. I am struggling with this right now. If you compare the original DefaultLayouts.xml you will notice significant differences between the original DeafualtLayouts and your exported modified template. I believe this difference is causing the exported modified .xml file to not be read properly during new user setup and so you get a best effort start menu from the system. I am working on modifying the DefaultLayouts.xml to resolve this issue but I am finding some missing closing tags inside the body. I am following a post I found here:

If I resolve the formatting issues I will post back.

IE 11 is completely gone from Win10; only Edge remains as a browser.

Most of the Win7 GPOs will work in Win10. Once you try a GPO, post back here if it didn’t work.

Just a note here.. Windows 10 includes IE11 — its just a little hidden. START>>All Apps>>Windows Accessories>>IE11 (or just type Internet Explorer 11 in Cortana search)

Also you can view how to Customize Windows 10 Start with Group Policy on TechNet for details on how to.