Settings app crashes immediately in Windows 10 (Build 14905)

Question

Since a while, the Windows 10 "immersive" settings app crashes immediately after opening certain pages (build 14905).

• Crashes: System, Devices, Network & Internet, Personalization, Accounts, Time & language, Ease of Access, Privacy
• Doesn't crash: Network and Internet, Update & security

The pages that don't crash do crash on some sub-pages.

If I try to open display settings on the desktop, I get a message box saying:

ms-settings:display

This file does not have a program associated with it for performing this action. Please install a program or, if one is already installed, create an association in the Default Programs control panel.

I've tried every suggestion I could find, including various troubleshooters, creating a new admin user, and even resetting windows (!) however nothing worked. I won't detail what I tried since I've found the solution while writing this question (see below). Hopefully it will keep somebody from reinstalling their OS.

Answer 1

The cause is the following bug, from the release notes of 14905:

The Settings app may crash on certain editions of Windows 10 when navigating to different settings pages due to a missing .dll file. We are working on getting this fixed soon

I could swear this comment wasn't there initially, the only listed problem with the settings app in this build was that you couldn't change insider rings. Seems that internally at MS nobody uses Windows home edition ;-).

The solution is to grab LockdownUtil.dll from %WINDIR\system32 from a Windows professional edition of the same build, and place it in your system32 directory. Thankfully I've got another computer running pro, but you can also grab the file from the net if you feel adventurous / desperate.

Note again, resetting your PC does not fix this. Returning to a previous build should, but that didn't work in my case.

Answer 2

This bug is fixed in Build 14915:

We fixed the issue causing the Settings app to crash on certain editions of Windows 10 when navigating to different settings pages due to a missing .dll file.

So, check for updates and get the Build 14915.

Answer 3

I have this problem on Windows 1809 and what I have figured out so far is that it appears to be somehow caused by a user account being in the Guests group, or being the Guest account.

I haven't been able to narrow down the exact problem yet (Process Monitor isn't showing much), but it appears that even putting the account into the Administrators group doesn't help. As long as an account is in the Guests group, it exhibits this problem.

Other related symptoms I've intermittently observed include not being able to right-click the taskbar or sometimes certain items on the taskbar (like the Explorer icon), or the Indexing Service saying "Waiting to receive indexing status", etc. I'll report back with more information if I find any.