Author Topic: (Solved) - windows 7 64 bit lost taskbar, start menu and desktop icons (Read 18003 times)

installer69 · « **on:** September 17, 2014, 09:44:59 am »

Hi, the above happened and may or may not have coincided with using Adwcleaner as a precaution. Re booted and presented with a black screen with just a curser. Ctrl, Alt Del brings up task manager and I can see that explorer.exe is running. Close it and restart it and all it launches is a my computer screen. Strangely, I cannot launch Taskbar and Start Menu from Control Panel\Appearance and Personalization or via the command prompt. I can add windows 7 desktop gadgets to my empty black desktop. The windows key does not launch anything either.
I have tried restoring to last good, SFC scannow, chkdsk /f and upgrade reinstall of windows 7. Various malware scanners report no problems.
Windows Repair 2.8.9 hangs whenever I try to action or scan anything.
Everything is there and working (except those I've mentioned) and can be started from explorer windows but it is a bit of a pain to have lost the familiar bits. Is this a shell problem?
Please help

Boggin · « **Reply #1 on:** September 17, 2014, 10:32:10 am »

When you were in Safe Mode to select LKGC do you also have an option for Repair your Computer to navigate into the Recovery Environment.

In there you will have options for Startup Repair and using your Restore Points back to before you downloaded AdwCleaner if they still exist.

It's recommended running Startup Repair up to three times if it doesn't do it at first.

There's an icon cache rebuilder patch plus additional steps you can also try, but may not restore the Start Menu or the Taskbar http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/49819-icon-cache-rebuild.html

If you have an install disk that you can boot up with, you can also navigate to the RE by selecting Repair your Computer then selecting Command Prompt and enter-

bootrec /fixmbr
exit (to close command window)

If you don't have an install disk then you can download/save an ISO for your version from http://www.w7forums.com/threads/official-windows-7-sp1-iso-image-downloads.12325/page-2#post-124821 and use http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/html/pbPage.Help_Win7_usbdvd_dwnTool to create a bootable USB/DVD.

installer69 · « **Reply #2 on:** September 17, 2014, 11:26:41 am »

Hi Boggin,

I've been in and out of the recovery environment so much I hope to never see it again. I tried a system restore to before adwcleaner so I suppose I answered my own question as that didn't fix it.

I downloaded a retail disc as mine is an oem system and that's how I did the upgrade install which took hours and achieved nothing.

I'm just going to try bootrec /fixmbr which sadly is the only thing in your helpful list that I haven't tried yet.

I'll report back but if anything else comes to mind, please let me know.

Shane · « **Reply #3 on:** September 17, 2014, 01:28:23 pm »

Normally I never offer this right off the bat, but I wouldnt mind connecting to you with teamviewer and taking a look. The reason why is if I can find the reason for it, and the fix is one that can be automated I can add it to the windows repair, also I would like to see what and why WR is hanging up as well, that way I can put in a check or handle for situations like that

Shane

installer69 · « **Reply #4 on:** September 17, 2014, 01:39:17 pm »

Shane, if you are happy to have a look I don't mind letting you in. I've got an identical laptop that's my daughters and I've been poring my way through the registry, services etc trying to spot a difference. Would I private message yu the teamviewer code?

Boggin · « **Reply #5 on:** September 17, 2014, 02:14:29 pm »

I take it Startup Repair was useless as well ?

Well, we'll see what the bootrec command can achieve, but sometimes running an offboot sfc /scannow can resolve if it's the system files that are corrupt even though you've already run that within Windows.

To do that, boot up with the install disk and navigate to the RE/Command Prompt and enter -

bcdedit |find "osdevice" (that's a Pipe symbol before find)

Then using whichever partition letter that gives, enter (assuming C: )

sfc /scannow /offbootdir=C:\ /offwindir=C:\Windows

And that will give its report just as it does when done within Windows.

Did the icon rebuild patch/steps have any effect ?

installer69 · « **Reply #6 on:** September 17, 2014, 02:18:30 pm »

Yup, startup repair useless. Bootrec useless. Tried creating another account and logging in - same.
Already tried an off boot SFC which found no issues.
Icon rebuild - no effect

Boggin · « **Reply #7 on:** September 17, 2014, 02:24:39 pm »

This is why it's best to create regular system images - one would certainly have been useful right now

installer69 · « **Reply #8 on:** September 17, 2014, 02:27:12 pm »

You're not wrong. I rue the days I closed the nag screen that asked if I wanted to make a backup.
The 'only' good point is that I have lost nothing. With effort I can still launch all my programs but it really is painful when you are used to using the GUI.
I leave linux for work.

Shane · « **Reply #9 on:** September 18, 2014, 01:12:06 pm »

OK I got him fixed

Took me a little while but I found the problem, and honestly it didnt stand out at all.

When you open regedit and go to
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon
"Shell"="explorer.exe"

Just like it should. So since it showed the right value I didn't touch it. I then loaded up process monitor and watched everything that explorer.exe touched when starting up.

When explorer.exe got to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon and looked at the shell vaule it got something different!
Process monitor reported this
Type: REG_SZ, Length: 24, Data: explorer.exeL

Notice the L at the end of it, but I double checked regedit and there was no L.

So in regedit I went ahead and changed the shell value to explorer.exe1 and saved it then changed it back to explorer.exe and saved it. I did this to force regedit to write the value.

Then I started explorer.exe and the desktop appeared. I have no clue why regedit wasnt showing the L, but when I changed the value it corrected it and started working.

I am adding that shell value to the next update of Windows Repair, so if it happens to anyone else WR will be able to fix it

Shane

installer69 · « **Reply #10 on:** September 18, 2014, 01:52:27 pm »

For anyone who comes across this forum after suffering the same problem I had - consider yourself fortunate.

Shane put a lot of effort that I can never truly thank him enough for going through registry values that I had studied for hours until he spotted something using software I would never have come across - the addition of one character in a value.

Just to add further description in case it helps when trawled by google, explorer.exe was opening as a file explorer window instead of in desktop mode so no taskbar, desktop icons or start menu.

Shane, I wish I could do more but I've paypaled you a drink to say thanks

Boggin · « **Reply #11 on:** September 18, 2014, 02:01:37 pm »

Nice one Shane !

Is there any way AdwCleaner could have caused that ?

Shane · « **Reply #12 on:** September 18, 2014, 02:05:51 pm »

Quote from: installer69 on September 18, 2014, 01:52:27 pm

For anyone who comes across this forum after suffering the same problem I had - consider yourself fortunate.

Shane put a lot of effort that I can never truly thank him enough for going through registry values that I had studied for hours until he spotted something using software I would never have come across - the addition of one character in a value.

Just to add further description in case it helps when trawled by google, explorer.exe was opening as a file explorer window instead of in desktop mode so no taskbar, desktop icons or start menu.

Shane, I wish I could do more but I've paypaled you a drink to say thanks

Happy to help. I am adding that registry value to WR as I type this

You would have spotted it IF regedit would have shown that extra char with it. So since the shell vaule was reading to a file that wasnt there then explorer was only opening in file mode instead of desktop

Quote

Nice one Shane !

Is there any way AdwCleaner could have caused that ?

No way for me to tell. I found the problem but not what caused it. I found a windows api that tells me the last date and time modified of a registry key. I am going to be adding a tool to the WR that will use this, I wish I had it done as I could have looked to see when the last time the shell value was changed.

Also the reason I am adding this to the WR, when you run the reset registry permissions every key gets its last modified time updated, since the key is being modified. So in the add/remove programs some programs will shw as installed with that date. This is because when a program installs and makes the uninstall keys for the add/remove programs, if the key "InstalledDate" isnt there then add/remove programs will use the last modified date instead.

So I am going to make a tool that will loop through that before the repair and for any that doesnt have a key of "InstalledDate" or "InstalledOn" (cant remember which right now) then my program will make that key and put the date of the last modified in it. That way the date installed will always show properly in the add/remove after the repair :-D

Shane