Share via

Windows 10/11: Troubleshootiong disappearing Start Menu, Locked Search Bar and Freezing Explorer

  • Article

Issue 

The Start menu and/or Search bar in taskbar Stops responding, disappears, not clickable. 

Details 

Once clicked on start menu and/or search bar, it will not respond at all, or start menu and search icon disappears from taskbar, The key combination (e.g: Win+R) will be working.

Settings and most or all Universal apps will receive App blocked message. 

Application log 

‎Faulting module name: Windows.UI.Xaml.dll
‎Faulting module path: C:\Windows\System32\Windows.UI.Xaml.dll‎

Resolution

User should be admin to run below command

Get-AppXPackage -AllUsers | Foreach {Add-AppxPackage -DisableDevelopmentMode -Register "$($_.InstallLocation)\AppXManifest.xml"}

If blocked from AppLocker, error occurs, Empty C:\Windows\System32\AppLocker folder. The folder can be seen by built in Admin account or system only

Update  8/8/22

This turned out to be a known issue with Carbon Black App Control Agent -

https://community.carbonblack.com/t5/Knowledge-Base/App-Control-File-Explorer-Hangs-or-Freezes-After-Agent-Upgrade/ta-p/111863

Authors