Hello Tom's Hardware community.
I am going right straight to the issue,
explorer.exe has decided not to run anymore. (on Windows 8.1 Pro x64)
When I turn my PC on, I get past the boot screen, and I am able to login with my Windows user, so far so good. Afterwards, all I'm left with is a black screen, no desktop icons, wallpaper nor taskbar. Just my mouse pointer on a black screen.
I still have access to the Task Manager, cmd, Control Panel, and virtually all of my PC. I have searched a lot on Google, but nothing has helped so far, and by the way, explorer.exe won't run from the Task Manager. The only way I can make it run (but then it just opens a My Computer window, where all drives are listed) is by renaming it.
I have noticed that I can run it if its name is different than the one in the Winlogon/Shell registry key.
Oh, I have to mention that my connection is down, and will be down for an indeterminate amount of time.
Here's a rough list of what I've tried so far (sorted randomly):
Booting in safe mode with startup programs disabled.
sfc /scannow which results in some files which cannot be repaired, but the log doesn't mention explorer.exw
sfc /scanfile=c:\windows\explorer.exe just to make sure, still no problems.
Malwarebytes virus scan, 2 found and deleted.
Windows's (forgot the name, I think Defender..) native antivirus.
Restoring from a restore point (pretty strange that it did not have any effect.
Deleted explorer.exe from Image File Execution Options
but I am still facing this problem.
I think I got the most important ones, I can't remember what else I did.
So, this seemed like a small issue at first, but after trying all those possible solutions, I really don't have the faintest clue about what could be causing this.
Thanks in advance,
fr0st.
EDIT: Oh, thinking of it, I might know what's going on. I was browsing for possible solutions, when I saw trying to re-register ExplorerFrame.dll.
It resulted in an error stating that the dll was registered but the entry point DllRegistryServer was missing.
By the way I once got an error saying: "explorer.exe Interface not registered"inside the conteol panel, where some features are disabled sue to this whole problem.
I am going right straight to the issue,
explorer.exe has decided not to run anymore. (on Windows 8.1 Pro x64)
When I turn my PC on, I get past the boot screen, and I am able to login with my Windows user, so far so good. Afterwards, all I'm left with is a black screen, no desktop icons, wallpaper nor taskbar. Just my mouse pointer on a black screen.
I still have access to the Task Manager, cmd, Control Panel, and virtually all of my PC. I have searched a lot on Google, but nothing has helped so far, and by the way, explorer.exe won't run from the Task Manager. The only way I can make it run (but then it just opens a My Computer window, where all drives are listed) is by renaming it.
I have noticed that I can run it if its name is different than the one in the Winlogon/Shell registry key.
Oh, I have to mention that my connection is down, and will be down for an indeterminate amount of time.
Here's a rough list of what I've tried so far (sorted randomly):
Booting in safe mode with startup programs disabled.
sfc /scannow which results in some files which cannot be repaired, but the log doesn't mention explorer.exw
sfc /scanfile=c:\windows\explorer.exe just to make sure, still no problems.
Malwarebytes virus scan, 2 found and deleted.
Windows's (forgot the name, I think Defender..) native antivirus.
Restoring from a restore point (pretty strange that it did not have any effect.
Deleted explorer.exe from Image File Execution Options
but I am still facing this problem.
I think I got the most important ones, I can't remember what else I did.
So, this seemed like a small issue at first, but after trying all those possible solutions, I really don't have the faintest clue about what could be causing this.
Thanks in advance,
fr0st.
EDIT: Oh, thinking of it, I might know what's going on. I was browsing for possible solutions, when I saw trying to re-register ExplorerFrame.dll.
It resulted in an error stating that the dll was registered but the entry point DllRegistryServer was missing.
By the way I once got an error saying: "explorer.exe Interface not registered"inside the conteol panel, where some features are disabled sue to this whole problem.
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