Start menu broken and Icons completely missing

So that's the best I could do with the title. It all started when I was playing skyrim and it crashed, I couldn't open task manager so I signed out and signed in again. After that I couldn't click on anything in my taskbar that had to do with windows (sound manager, notifications) and I couldn't open the start menu or search anything in the search box. I could open programs from the taskbar.

So I search online for a fix to this issue and I found This page Nothing helped until step 4. After completing step 4 the task menu actually opened and I could click on everything else normally BUT all of the programs from the start menu were gone, even the documents option above settings is gone. Only windows apps are not missing and are functional. I can't add anything in the start menu either. When I tried to at least activate the documents shortcut from personilization I found out that everything except settings was grayed out.

Restarted the computer, restarted explorer.exe.No results. Nothing, and I mean NOTHING has annoyed me as much as this has.

Poroner

Posted 2015-11-08T02:40:42.750

Reputation: 13

I also found out that my pc has slowed down in general. Games are running worse and boot up slower. This issue is awful. – Poroner – 2015-11-08T02:44:25.627

Sounds like a HDD that is failing. Everything you describe can be explained by a HDD that has bad sectors, run SFC and DISM to confirm, post results in question itself ( not a comment ) – Ramhound – 2015-11-08T03:17:43.033

the new Startmenu sucks and often has such issues. Try StartIsBack++: http://superuser.com/a/946675/174557

– magicandre1981 – 2015-11-08T08:31:26.220

Answers

While it could be a bad HDD, something like that is usually caused by a corrupted OS. Try refreshing the install before buying a new HDD. (Refresh reinstalls system data without deleting personal data)

Here are instructions: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/refresh-is-part-of-reset-in-windows-10

(I know the explanation of refresh was not 100% accurate, but it serves as a general explanation)

Michael

Posted 2015-11-08T02:40:42.750

Reputation: 26

Right...A OS does not just become corrupt without a reason. – Ramhound – 2015-11-08T03:57:49.027

Agreed, but that reason can be anything from power surge to ...well, anything. The OP mentioned Skyrim crashing as the catalyst. (Which certainly could have been caused by a bad HDD... or any number of other things) I would certainly not rule out HDD as an issue, but refreshing the install is both less expensive and easier all around than replacing the drive, so IMHO, I would try that first. – Michael – 2015-11-08T04:23:07.753

@Michael If the drive is about to fail the first thing to do is a backup while you can still read the drive. That should be done before any attempt at a refresh. – DavidPostill – 2015-11-08T09:58:31.233

1I don't know why you got downvoted sir but that fixed the issue. That + restarting windows explorer for some reason. It also fixed the issue with everything being slower in general. My windows files are on an SSD and it's relatively new. So I doubt that's the reason it happened but all I can do now is wait and see. Thank you for your answer – Poroner – 2015-11-09T05:55:34.350

Refreshing windows fixed my issue. I honestly don't know what caused it. I don't think my drives had anything to do with it but I can't say with certainty. Anyway thank you.

Poroner

Posted 2015-11-08T02:40:42.750

Reputation: 13