Critical process died on startup (Windows 10)

Dimbata

Reputable
Apr 6, 2015
12
0
4,510
Today I started my PC and let it load while I was getting myself a glass of water. Much to my surprise when I got back to the PC I saw the default "Restart or Advanced startup settings" so I just restarted it and got a Critical process died error. I restarted again but I got the same error. I searched for solutions on my phone, but most of them require me to log into Windows, but that error is keeping me from doing that. So naturally I thought about starting it in Safe Mode, but even in Safe Mode I get that error.
I found that I can run cmd without loading Windows so I tried a few solutions like "sfc /scannow" which did returned something like this: ”windows resource protection could not perform the requested operation".
So I tried "chkdsk C: /f /x /r", but that had an ETA of a few hundred hours, so I stopped it.
The next thing I tried is letting Windows do its startup repair and it repaired the C: drive, but that didn't help either.
I have Linux installed as well so I booted up Linux and tried to open the Windows partitions which resulted in this error: "the ntfs partition is in an unsafe state please resume and shutdown windows fully". I looked it up and with "sudo ntfsfix /dev/sda1" I was able to open up the C: drive from Linux and access all files. Unfortunately I still cannot boot up into Windows.

Long story short: I can't boot into Windows because of a blue screen with a "Critical process died" error.
I have a Linux dual boot with which I can access the Windows' drives if it helps.

PS: Unfortunately I do not have a recovery point.
 
Solution
try chkdsk without /x, it shouldn't take that long unless you have a few dozen network drives or hdd attached to PC

knowing the file name would tell me how easy it is to repair... it could be login or csrss (client server system, your user environment) or simply ntoskrnl and windows can't run without it.
is linux on same drive or separate? if you have backups I would just fresh install as it could be fastest way

do you have a win 10 installer - On another PC, download the Windows 10 media creation tool and use it to make a win 10 installer on USB - just a handy boot disk if nothing else

can try to fix MBR, it might help... without knowing what file name is I am shooting in dark
change boot order so USB is first, hdd second
boot...

Colif

Win 11 Master
Moderator
try chkdsk without /x, it shouldn't take that long unless you have a few dozen network drives or hdd attached to PC

knowing the file name would tell me how easy it is to repair... it could be login or csrss (client server system, your user environment) or simply ntoskrnl and windows can't run without it.
is linux on same drive or separate? if you have backups I would just fresh install as it could be fastest way

do you have a win 10 installer - On another PC, download the Windows 10 media creation tool and use it to make a win 10 installer on USB - just a handy boot disk if nothing else

can try to fix MBR, it might help... without knowing what file name is I am shooting in dark
change boot order so USB is first, hdd second
boot from installer
on screen after languages, choose repair this pc, not install.
choose troubleshoot
choose advanced
choose command prompt
We need to use the Bootrec.exe tool. Click on command prompt and type in the following commands, one after the other:
bootrec /RebuildBcd
bootrec /fixMbr
bootrec /fixboot
Exit

Now go ahead and reboot your system. In some cases you may need to run some additional commands.
bootsect /nt60 SYS or bootsect /nt60 ALL
 
Solution