Control Panel is empty

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I had to do a reinstall of Win10 and started doing updates via WUMGR.

I had some problems with 2022-04 Update for Windows 10 Version 20H2 (KB4023057) which took 36 hours to finally install after being stuck for 36 hours

2022-05 Cumulative Update for Windows 10 Version 20H2 (KB5013942) still won’t install but I see others are having that problem as well. I’ll wait to see if it cures itself within the next week.

I wanted to setup Previous Version but I found there are no items in the control panel.

I also can’t setup a System Restore

I ran and everything looked fine

SFC /scannow
DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth
DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth
DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth

Any thoughts? that might help?

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Nothing in Control Panel?
How did you open CP?
Can you post a screenshot?

cheers, Paul

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I opened the Control panel the usual way by clicking on its icon

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That’s impressive!

Can you create a new user, login as the new user and open CP?

cheers, Paul

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New user account didn’t change anything

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Neither did going into safe mode

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Something may be corrupted. Try this:

• Open an administrative command prompt (CMD)
• Type: DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
• When finished, type: sfc /scannow
• When finished, reboot

Then check Control Panel.

On permanent hiatus {with backup and coffee}
offline▸ Win10Pro 2004.19041.572 x64 i3-3220 RAM8GB HDD Firefox83.0b3 WindowsDefender
offline▸ Acer TravelMate P215-52 RAM8GB Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1265 x64 i5-10210U SSD Firefox106.0 MicrosoftDefender
online▸ Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1992 x64 i5-9400 RAM16GB HDD Firefox116.0b3 MicrosoftDefender

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WSRonS54 wrote:

I ran and everything looked fine SFC /scannow DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth

Yes, tried that, didn’t help

(pardon my grammar in my first post, on the computer to long)

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My apologies for suggesting something you already mentioned and attempted. Your grammar is just fine.

On permanent hiatus {with backup and coffee}
offline▸ Win10Pro 2004.19041.572 x64 i3-3220 RAM8GB HDD Firefox83.0b3 WindowsDefender
offline▸ Acer TravelMate P215-52 RAM8GB Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1265 x64 i5-10210U SSD Firefox106.0 MicrosoftDefender
online▸ Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1992 x64 i5-9400 RAM16GB HDD Firefox116.0b3 MicrosoftDefender

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I was just on run > rsop.msc  and there are settings for the Control Panel but I’m not familiar with the syntax or options.

Anything there that might help?

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There are 3 windows open in the screen shot. I ran RSOP as an administrator and there are some items grayed out nor am I able to enable/disable items

 

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I fixed it

I had to go into gpedit.msc and disable “Show only specified Control Panel Items”

 

Thanks for your time

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GREAT to hear that all it took was digging into group policy to get your control panel upright and fully functional again!

BUT, it also begs the question…how did it get that way in the first place, given that the setting you had to change isn’t on most folks’ radars when it comes to group policy settings. I checked on my Win 10 machines and neither one if them has that setting enabled, its just listed as what it should be, IMHO, “Not configured”.

Although you had an excessively long installation of KB4023057, I doubt that the KB itself had anything to do with changing your gpedit settings for Control Panel. If that were expected behavior for that KB, I think we would have heard something from someone by now in the form of a complaint about it.

As far as KB4023057 itself goes, the folks here seem to me to be evenly split between those that avoid it (me, for example) or uninstall it if it sneaks its way onto their system, and those that have installed every iteration of it over the last couple of years with no issues whatsoever.

KB4023057, in a nutshell, is supposed to “grease the skids” for the installation of the monthly updates by Windows Update (WU) and do the same towards the installation of the periodic Feature Updates by WU as well.

Given the info in the prior two paragraphs, the choice is yours with regards to uninstalling the KB if you wish to do so, given how long it took to install itself.

However, one thought just came to mind. It could be that, because things didn’t go so well for the installation of KB4023057 in that it took 36 hours to install, something went sideways during the installation (something that wasn’t supposed to happen) that then caused both the change within group policy settings for control panel and the installation of KB4023057 to take 36 hours to finish.

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