Recently, I have run into several instances in which the Start Menu in Windows 10 or Server 2016 has stopped opening.
Most of the solutions posted in forums and on blogs all point to things like running sfc /scannow or DISM /Online /Clean-Image /RestoreHealth. These can potentially resolve the issue, however, they haven’t in any of my cases.
In my cases, it turns out that something in the local user profile related to the Start Menu is corrupted. In specific, the TileDataLayer Database, Packages Folder and the UsrClass.dat file can become corrupted. My experience was related to a custom Default User profile and a published desktop with persistent user profiles.
The solution is to do this:
- You need to have an account that doesn’t have the Start Menu problems, as you need good copies of the TileDataLayer Database to copy over.
- Then you need to logon with an admin account with rights to both user profiles.
- Rename or delete (whichever you are comfortable doing) the following:
%LOCALAPPDATA%Packages to Packages.old
%LOCALAPPDATA%MicrosoftWindowsUsrClass.dat to UsrClass.old
- Copy the %LOCALAPPDATA%TileDataLayerDatabase from the profile with the working Start Menu into the profile of the corrupted Start Menu.
- Reboot your machine and logon as the user with problems and those problems should be resolved.
