Software review series: HWiNFO

A lot of users lately reported getting an error that says, “The application has failed to start because its side-by-side configuration is incorrect”. This kind of error can pop up when you try to open a number of programs, regardless of their origin, the developer, and compatibility. Here’s the full context of the error message:

“<PATH OF THE EXECUTABLE FILE>, This application has failed to start because its side-by0side configuration is incorrect. Please see the application event log or use the command-line sxstrace.exe tool for more detail”.

This kind of problem has something to do with the C++ runtime package in the background. It could also be related to an error for a registry value. Whatever the cause is, you can fix this error with the help of some suggestions provided in this post. You can try to reinstall the application or check the registry setting or reinstall the suitable Visual C++ Runtimes or re-enable the Microsoft .NET Framework. For more details, refer to the instructions given below.

Option 1 – Try to reinstall the application

There are times when some supporting module for your application under the hood could have messed up the application. And so to fix that, you need to uninstall the concerned application and then try reinstalling it again. Once you’re done, check if it fixed the problem or not.

Option 2 – Try to change the Registry setting

• Tap the Win + R key combination to open the Run dialog box.
• Then type “Regedit” in the fields and tap Enter to open the Registry Editor.
• Next, navigate to this registry key: Computer HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE SOFTWARE Microsoft Windows NT CurrentVersion SideBySide Winners x86_policy.9.0.microsoft.vc90.crt_1fc8b3b9a1e18e3b_none_02d0010672fd8219 9.0
• From there, look for a String value named “default” and double click on it.
• After that, change its Value data to match the one as the third value in BINARY.
• Now restart your computer to successfully apply the changes made.

Option 3 – Try reinstalling the appropriate Visual C++ Runtime

• You need to open the Event Viewer first by searching for it in the Windows Search box.
• After opening Event Viewer, look for the error events that are sourced by SideBySide.
• Next, look for the actual Visual C++ Runtime module that’s causing the error.
• Now download the module from the official website of Microsoft Support and then install it and see if it fixed the problem.

Option 4 – Re-enable the Microsoft .NET Framework

You could also try to disable the Microsoft .NET Framework then enable the latest version of the .NET Framework on your PC and check if the error is fixed.

Error Code “Windows 10 isn’t activated after upgrading for free” – What is it?

Windows 10 isn’t activated error occurs when Windows users attempt to upgrade to Windows 10 for free and end up in a non-activated state. It is a Windows 10 activation error affecting PC owners who attempt to upgrade their Windows 7 or Windows 8.1 operating systems. A message box will appear with the following message: “Windows 10 isn’t activated after upgrading for free from Windows 7 SPI or Windows 8.1 update.”

Common symptoms of this error code include the following:

• Inability to upgrade for free to Windows 10
• The appearance of activation error code in the message box

Solution

Error Causes

To understand the cause of this activation error, users will need to understand activation within Windows. Activation is a process that allows Windows to verify that you are upgrading your operating system based on the Microsoft Software Licensing Terms. These terms specify, for instance, the number of devices upon which you can use Windows.

Once you have a genuine copy of Windows and you are following the terms mentioned earlier, you should be able to activate and complete the upgrade to Windows 10. However, the activation fails when these conditions are not met. Note also that the error may occur if users fail to upgrade to Windows 10 before reinstalling, requiring them to repeat the installation process by first going back to the previous version of Windows present on their system. Once the upgrade process is not done as should, you might encounter other Windows 10 errors such as error code 0xc0000142

If you see this error code, “Windows 10 isn’t activated after upgrading for free” proceed to rectify it using manual repair methods below.

Further Information and Manual Repair

To fix this activation error code in Windows 10, users will need to employ at least one manual repair procedure. This process can successfully be completed by non-technical Windows users. However, you may also consider getting assistance from a Windows repair technician if you are not certain you have the requisite skills needed to complete the manual repair tasks below.

The main methods to resolve the error code “Windows 10 isn’t activated after upgrading for free from Windows 7 SPI or Windows 8.1 update” is as follows:

Method One: Manually Activate Windows

If you attempted upgrading for free to Windows 10 and ended up with the activation error you will need to first perform a manual activation. Follow the steps below to complete the process.

• Step one: Tap or click the Start button
• Step two: Select Settings then Update & security
• Step three: Select Activation
• Step four: Once activation status is Connect to the Internet to activate Windows, click or tap Activate

The steps above enable users to successfully activate Windows 10 if the issue involves a connection problem. However, if Windows is not activated, it may mean your copy of Windows is not genuine. This may require you purchase a copy of Windows to rectify the issue. However, if you have a genuine copy of Windows proceed by applying the steps found in method two.

Method Two: Use Product Key to Verify Copy of Windows

A valid product key is one way you can verify your copy of Windows is genuine. This will enable you to complete activation and allow you to access the free upgrade to Windows 10. Follow the steps below.

• Step one: Click or tap the Start button
• Step two: Select Settings then Update & security
• Step three: Click Activation
• Step four: Select Change Product Key then type in the product key. (Ensure you type the 25 characters in the correct order.)

Method Three: Use an Automated Tool

Error codes in Windows often occur due to poor maintenance of one’s PC. To improve your system and reduce your machine’s risk of experiencing error codes, download a powerful automated tool. This tool is both powerful and user-friendly, making its benefits accessible to even the most non-technical Windows users.

If you encounter an error while trying to burn files to a CD or disk on your Windows 10 computer, stating, “Windows Media Player cannot burn some of the files”, read on as this post will guide you in fixing the error. Here’s the complete error message:

“Windows Media Player cannot burn some of the files. To investigate the problem, click the icon next to the files in the burn list.”

As you know, the Windows Media Player helps you burn songs or audio files to CD or disk but it does not always end up successfully as you could encounter some setbacks such as this particular error. Usually, this kind of issue occurs if an audio file does not comply with some restrictions so the Windows Media Player pops up this error instead. You can encounter this error message if:

• You include a file that’s not an audio file.
• If the total time limit exceeds 80 minutes (even though a CD has 700 MB storage capacity, you can’t burn audio of more than 80 minutes long)

To resolve the error, you have to remove the unsupported files from the burning list, change the burning speed or execute some tweaks in the Privacy settings. For more details, refer to the instructions provided below.

Option 1 – Get rid of the unsupported files from the burning list

You must get rid of the unsupported files from the list of files to burn. This list can be found on the right-hand side of the Windows Media Player. One of the indications that a file is causing problems is when there is a white cross in a red circle next to the file. You can simply click on that icon to remove the file from the burning list. Once you’ve gotten rid of all the unsupported files, try to burn your files to the CD or disk once more.

Option 2 – Try to modify the Privacy settings

In case you don’t know, the Windows Media Player comes with privacy settings that help you in various situations. However, on rare occasions, those settings could also trigger errors and this might be the one that’s causing the “Windows Media Player cannot burn some of the files” to pop up. Thus, you can try disabling these options to resolve the error. How? Refer to these steps:

• Open the Windows Media Player.
• Then go to Tools > Options. If you aren’t able to find the Tools menu, just tap the Ctrl + M keys. On the other hand, you can also tap the Alt key to display the menu options.
• Once you’ve opened the Options window, go to the Privacy tab where you can the “Enhanced Playback and Device Experience” section.
• In this section, you can find the following options. Make sure to disable them all.
  • Display media information from the Internet
  • Update music files by retrieving media info from the Internet
  • Download usage rights automatically when I play or sync a file
  • Automatically check if protected files need to be refreshed
  • Set clock on devices automatically

• After you disable the options listed above, click on the Apply and OK buttons to save the changes made and then try to burn the files again.

Option 3 – Try to change the burning speed

Since the burning speed is set to fastest by default, you can try to change the burning speed to resolve the problem. All you have to do is open the Options window and then go to the Burn tab. From there, select either Medium or Slow burning speed and save the changes made. Now try to burn your files to the CD or disk once again.

Xpcom.dll Error Code - What is it?

To understand the Xpcom.dll error better, first, you need to know what Xpcom.dll file is. Xpcom.dll is basically a typical DLL (Dynamic Link Library) file. It is associated with Firefox developed by Mozilla Foundation for the Windows Operating System. DLL file contains small programs similar to exe (executable) files. Just like any other DLL file, Xpcom.dll helps loads and run programs smoothly. Xpcom.dll functions as a shared file that can be used to run multiple programs on your PC. Xpcom.dll error code occurs when Windows cannot properly load the xpcom.dll file. The error may pop up on the screen in any one of the following formats:

• "Xpcom.dll not found."
• "The file xpcom.dll is missing."
• "Cannot register xpcom.dll."
• "Cannot find C:\Windows\System32\xpcom.dll."
• "This application failed to start because xpcom.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix this problem."
• "Xpcom.dll Access Violation."
• "Cannot start Firefox. A required component is missing: xpcom.dll. Please install Firefox again."

The xpcom.dll error can occur during program installation or while rebooting your PC or when shutting it down.[/section]

Solution

Error Causes

It is difficult to narrow down a single cause of this error code simply because the Xpcom.dll error code may be triggered due to several reasons. Some of the common causes include:

• Invalid or corrupt xpcom.dll registry entry
• Viral infection
• Outdated PC drivers
• Another program overwrote the required version of xpcom.dll
• Xpcom.dll file is accidentally deleted or uninstalled
• Mozilla Foundation hardware failure

Further Information and Manual Repair

Here are the best, quick and easy DIY methods to resolve Xpcom.dll error code on your system within minutes:

Method 1: Update Window Drivers

To resolve the xpcom.dll error on your system, try updating Window drivers. To do this simply use the driver update wizard from within Device Manager. The driver update wizard walks you through the entire drive update process, making it easy and hassle-free for you to update drivers.

Method 2: Download and Install Xpcom.dll File

Since DLL are shared files and used to run and load multiple programs, it is possible that you might have accidentally removed this file while uninstalling a program on your system. This is the reason why the Xpcom.dll file goes missing. To retrieve the Xpcom.dll file simply go to the recycle bin. Reinstall the deleted program. However, if it still doesn’t resolve the error, then it is advisable to download and install the Xpcom.dll file from a trusted DLL file website over the internet.

Method 3: Scan for Viruses and Repair the Registry

If the error code occurs due to malware infection or is related to registry issues, then simply download Restoro. This is a user-friendly and multi-functional PC Fixer deployed with 6 scanners including a powerful antivirus and a registry cleaner. It is compatible with all Windows versions. Simply run it to remove all types of viruses infecting your system and clean/repair the registry. Click here to download Restoro and resolve the Xpcom.dll error on your PC.

RSAT or Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 10 is a collection of programs for IT experts. It helps in managing Servers from a Windows 10 PC and starting with the Windows 10 v1809 or the October 2018 update, users have to install the Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 10 as Features on Demand or as Optional Features. The program includes the Microsoft Management Console or MMC snap-ins, Server Manager, consoles, Windows PowerShell cmdlets, and providers as well as command-line tools for managing roles and features that run on the Windows Server. So if you have updated your Windows 10 pc to v1809 or later then the RSAT tool has to be installed as a set of Features on Demand right from Windows 10. You can install RSAT Tools on Windows 10 Enterprise or Windows 10 Professional and once you install it, make sure that you do not install RSAT tools from the Microsoft Download page directly. Step 1: Open Settings and then go to Apps > Apps & Features. Step 2: Next, click on Manage Optional Features. Step 3: After that, click on Add a Feature which will load all the optional features one can install. Step 4: Now scroll to find the listing of all 18 RSAT tools and depending on what you need, click and install them. Step 5: Then go back to where you should see the progress of the installation. Click on the Manage Optional Features page to check the status. Note: If you are well-versed with the command line or automation, you can also install Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 10 via DISM /add-capability. And when you install anything via Features on Demand, they stay across Windows 10 version upgrades. On the other hand, if you feel that you don’t need a particular RSAT feature, you have the option to uninstall it using the Manage Option Features. However, bear in mind that some tools depend on one another which means that if you uninstall anything that has a dependency, it will only fail that’s why you need to be careful.

To uninstall an RSAT feature, here’s what you have to do:

Step 1: Go to Settings > Apps > Manage Optional Features. Step 2: After that, look for the list of installed feature that appears before this. Step 3: Now select the feature you want to uninstall and go back. If you have some system-related issues that need to get fixed, there is a one-click solution known as [product-name] you could check out to resolve them. This program is a useful and efficient tool that could repair corrupted registries and optimize your PC’s overall performance. Aside from that, it also cleans out your computer for any junk or corrupted files that help you eliminate any unwanted files from your system. This is basically a solution that’s within your grasp with just a click. It’s easy to use as it is user-friendly. For the complete set of instructions in downloading and using it, refer to the steps below.

As you know, Microsoft Office Word is a program that’s widely used all over the web and it’s because it’s the best program there is when it comes to editing and processing words. However, even when it is the best there is, it is not without its faults and so on as it can still encounter some errors every now and then. One of these errors is the Template_fields errors. When you encounter such an error, you will see a pop-up window. This strange error randomly appears on documents but you need not worry as this post will provide you with possible solutions to resolve the problem. But before you proceed with these solutions, you have to create a backup for all your Word documents to Microsoft OneDrive preferably. To fix the problem, you can try to disable the add-ins or try to start Word in Safe Mode or repair Office. For more details, refer to the options given below.

Option 1 – Disable the Add-ins

Although add-ins enhance Microsoft Word, there are times when they can also cause problems that end up breaking Microsoft Word instead of improving it which is why you have to disable them. Refer to the following steps to do so:

• Open Microsoft Word and then click on File.
• After that, select Options from the menu and then click on Add-ins.
• From there, you’ll see Manage: Com Add-ins as well as a button that says Go.
• Now click on the Go button and wait for a couple of seconds for a new window to appear.
• In the newly opened window, uncheck all the Add-ins and click on OK.
• Restart Microsoft Word and check if the “Template_fields” error is now fixed or not.

Option 2 – Try starting Word in Safe Mode

You might also want to try rebooting Microsoft Office in Safe Mode as it is one of your best shots in finding out whether the problem is internal or external. However, if the problem does not appear after you reboot Microsoft Word in Safe Mode, then there is a possibility that the problem is with Microsoft Office itself. On the other hand, if the problem persists, then it could be a deeper issue.

• First, start Microsoft Word in Safe Mode.
• Next, tap and hold the Ctrl key on your keyboard and open the Word document.
• After that, you should see a dialog box. Click on Yes and see if Microsoft Word opens in Safe Mode.
• Alternatively, you can open the search box and then type “winword.exe /safe” and hit Enter.

Option 3 – Try repairing Microsoft Office

If the first two options didn’t work, then you might want to try repairing Microsoft Office without getting rid of it. In most cases, this usually works in fixing any problems and returns the program back to its default state. To repair Microsoft Office, follow the steps below.

• Right-click on the Start Menu button and select Apps and Features.
• Next, scroll until you see the Microsoft Office program you want to repair and then select the Modify option.
• After that, follow the options to repair Microsoft Office and then restart your PC and see if the “Template_fields” error is no longer present.

Error Code 0x8024a000 – What is it?

The error code 0x8024a000 is related to Windows Update. You might see this error when you try to update Windows from the Microsoft site to use the latest and new features and technologies. A connection interruption between your computer and the Windows Update server may be the cause of this error. Operating system overload or corrupt registry may also cause this error. Check your modem, router, cable, etc. to be sure that these components are working well. Common symptoms

• You are trying to update Windows and its components such as system driver. The process suddenly stops and shows the error code 0x8024a000.
• Your PC frequently crashes with Error 0x8024A000 when running the same program.
• Windows runs sluggishly and responds slowly to mouse or keyboard input.
• You cannot connect to the Windows update server and the update will not start.
• You may also receive the error message saying that some files could not be updated.

Solution

Error Causes

There may be various causes for this error. Some of which are:

• No Internet connection
• Windows operating system is overloaded with invalid system references
• Corrupt download or incomplete installation of Windows Update software.
• Faulty cable, router or modem
• Windows update services are missing
• The system is infected with malicious programs
• Corrupted or deleted system registry files. PC registry errors occur over time because of constant writing, editing, moving, and deleting of information and files from your computer's registry time as programs are installed, modified, and removed.

Further Information and Manual Repair

We are going to discuss some easiest ways to fix up such issues and get your PC working so that you can install new updates.

Method 1:

1. Press the Windows button + W on your keyboard
2. In the search box type “troubleshooting”
3. In the troubleshooting box, select the View all tab
4. Run the troubleshooter for these services, and then try installing updates

Method 2:

Since most of the installation-related errors can be fixed by System File Checker System File Checker is a very efficient way to fix errors. Most of the installation-related errors can be fixed by a System File Checker. To use this tool follow instructions below: Swipe in from the right edge of the screen, and then tap Search. If you are using a mouse, point to the upper-right corner, move the pointer down, and then click Search. OR On the keyboard, press the Windows + W key. A search box will appear. Type cmd in the search box.

1. On the command prompt, type sfc/scannow
2. This will scan the system files and fix any error
3. Reboot the computer and try to install updates

OR

In the command prompt type sfc/scannow.

This will scan the system files and fix any errors. Reboot the computer and try to install updates.

Method 3:

1. Press Windows + R
2. A run dialog box will appear
3. type services.msc and press OK
4. Then in Services window, look for Background Intelligent Transfer Service. Click on it.
5. If it is the Services issue, then it will stop the service. Click on Start in the window below, and then click Apply and OK.
6. Reboot your machine and retry installing updates.

Method 4:

1. Click Start or open search box
2. Type cmd
3. Right-click on cmd in start menu and select ‘Run as Administrator’
4. Type net stop wuauserv
5. Hit Enter
6. Type ren c:windowsSoftwareDistribution softwaredistribution.old
7. Hit Enter
8. Type Exit
9. Hit Enter

Method 5:

Your PC is always accumulating junk files from normal web surfing and computer usage. If these junk files aren’t occasionally cleaned, it can cause Windows Update to respond slowly and display an error message 0x8024A000, possibly due to conflict with files or an overloaded hard drive. Cleaning up these temporary files will not only solve this problem, but it will also speed up PC performance. Follow the steps below to clean up this junk:

1. Click Start
2. Type "command" in the search box and DO NOT hit ENTER yet!
3. While holding CTRL-Shift on your keyboard, hit ENTER.
4. You will be prompted with a permission dialog box.
5. Click Yes.
6. A black box will open with a blinking cursor.
7. Type "cleanmgr" and hit ENTER.
8. Disk Cleanup will begin calculating how much occupied space you can get back.
9. The Disk Cleanup dialog box will show a series of checkboxes to select. In most cases, the "Temporary Files" category will occupy the most disk space.
10. Check the boxes of the categories you want to clean and click OK.

If you do not possess the technical expertise required to accomplish this yourself or do not feel comfortable doing so, download and install a powerful automated tool to get the job done.

Since Windows 10 introduced the concept of notifications, almost any application installed on your computer sends you one. However, there are times when too many notifications can be quite annoying. Although some of them are important, most of them are not and are only getting in the way of your tasks. So if you don’t like to be flooded with tons of notifications on your Windows 10 computer, say no more as this post will help you out in disabling notifications for any apps installed. And now with the new feature in Windows 10 called Focus Assist, you will be able to manage the level of notifications that you receive. This new feature also allows you to disable all notifications except for the ones from important or priority apps. You will just have to maintain a list of priority applications or you could also disable all the notifications except for the important ones like alarms. In addition, you could also set up some automatic rules such as the Focus Assist timings which means that you can make Focus Assist enabled for a certain period of time during the day or when you are duplicating your display or playing a game and whatnot. So if there is an application that keeps on spamming you with notifications, you can just disable the notifications for that application.

To get started on disabling notifications, refer to the steps given below.

• Step 1: Go to Settings > System.
• Step 2: From there, open Notifications and actions and then scroll down to the “Get notifications from these apps” section.
• Step 3: After that, look for the application that you want to disable notifications for and click on the toggle button that corresponds to disabling notifications for that application. You could also click open to explore additional settings for that particular application.

Note: You can disable notifications or just the notification banners, your choice. Aside from that, you can also control the notification sound as well as its behavior when the computer screen is locked. What’s more, is that you can also adjust the number of notifications displayed in the Action Center or select the priority applications. As stated earlier, Windows 10 gives you control that allows you to customize every nook and cranny of the notification on your Windows 10 computer. Apart from applications, there are also other notifications-related settings that you can control including disabling notifications about tips, tricks, and suggestions as well as summary notifications from Windows Defender that you get every time you use or scan your computer.

A PC that turns on by itself every so often can get quite annoying. Many users have faced this problem countless times. There are lots of possible reasons why your Windows 10 PC turns on by itself, wakes up from sleep, standby, or even when it’s shut down. To find out what exactly woke your computer, simply open Command Prompt as admin and type the following command:

powercfg –lastwake

Once you enter the command given above, it will show you the last device that woke your PC up. After that, you need to type in the next command:

powercfg –devicequery wake_armed

After entering the command, it will show you a list of all the devices that could wake your PC up. The goal in running these commands is to understand the reason what’s really causing your PC to turn on and see the reason is on the hardware level or not. Here are a couple of options you can try if your Windows 10 PC turns on by itself.

Option 1 – Try disabling Fast Startup

As you know, Windows 10 comes with a mode called Fast Startup which does not turn off the computer in the usual manner. This mode keeps your computer in a mixed state so that when you turn it on again, it will be a lot faster. However, as useful as this feature appear to be, some security experts find this an issue, for numerous reasons – for one, it can turn on your Windows 10 PC by itself. Thus, you need to disable this feature to fix the problem.

Option 2 – You need to stop the Task Scheduler from waking up your computer

There are times when the issue has something more to do with the software than hardware. It could be that you are using a Scheduled Task to get some work done on your computer at a particular time of the day or many times a day. That’s why if you really are using Task Scheduler, you need to change the Power settings of Windows to make sure that it ignores those tasks rather than deleting them instead when your computer is either on Hybrid or Standby mode.

• Open the Power Options and then click on “Change Plan Settings”.
• After that, make sure to choose the correct power plan and then select the “Change advanced power settings” option.
• Next, look for the Sleep tree and expand it to view the “Allow Wake Timers” option and then disable it. Disabling this option will make sure that none of the program that could wake your PC up when it’s either on shutdown or sleep mode. However, this only applies to laptops.

Option 3 – Try to disable Automatic Restart

There are instances when the computer crashes and the system restarts itself. This is actually by design – when your computer has been left on standby, the computer will restart and if the program repeats, it will keep on waking your PC up.

• In the Search bar, type in “system”.
• Once it appears from the search results, click on it.
• Next, select Advanced system settings on the left side and then go to the Advanced tab.
• From there, click on Settings under Startup and Recovery.
• Then unmark “Automatically Restart” and click on OK.

Option 4 – Adjust the Power Management option of both the Keyboard and Mouse

As you know, two of the culprits in waking your PC up are the keyboard and the mouse. If they’re slightly moved or hit, your PC turns on. To prevent these two from waking your computer up, you need to make some adjustments to their power management option since they have one. You can disable this option to ensure that they won’t wake your PC up unless you really want it to.

• Tap the Win + X keys and then tap M to open the Device Manager and list all the hardware on your computer. From there, select your keyboard or mouse.
• Next, right-click and then go to Properties and go to the Power Management tab.
• In this tab, uncheck the “Allow this device to wake the computer” box.

Note: Aside from the keyboard and mouse, if you are also using any gaming rig to play games on your computer, then you might have to disable their power options as well as they could also wake your computer. Just make sure that either the keyboard or the mouse has the ability to wake your computer up at the very least as it can be quite inconvenient to tap the Power button every time you want to turn on your computer.

Option 5 – Modify Wake On Lan

The Wake On Lan feature can bring back your computer online if it is connected to a network. This feature is useful especially when a computer wants to communicate or to send data or files to a network computer which should come online only when it’s requested. Wake On Lan is built into the hardware, i.e. network adapter so it is one of the possible reasons why your PC turns on by itself.

• Tap the Win + x keys then hit M to open the Device Manager and then under the Network adapters, look for the one that was listed above. Take note that you must not change anything with the ones that are listed as Miniport.
• Next, right-click and select Properties and then go to Power management and from there, uncheck the “Allow this device to wake up the computer” option. This will ensure that no PC on the network can ever wake your computer up.

Option 6 – Prevent any scheduled Windows Update and Automatic maintenance

It is also possible that the Windows Update has restarted your PC to complete the update. This depends on your active hours or a predefined schedule. AS you know Windows has a built-in Automatic Maintenance mode which wakes the computer up at the scheduled time and performs the system update. This could be one of the possible reasons why your computer turns on by itself. so to prevent any scheduled updates and maintenance, you can simply change the time for Automatic maintenance. How? Follow these steps:

• Open Settings then go to Windows Update and Security >Windows Update and select Active Hours.
• After that, type in “Automatic maintenance” in the search bar to change the time for Automatic maintenance.
• From there, you can adjust the timing or just uncheck the “Allow scheduled maintenance to wake up my computer at the scheduled time” box.

The SearchUI.exe file is the one that manages the search feature of Cortana. However, a number of users have recently reported that this feature stops responding within minutes of booting their Windows 10 computer. This kind of problem could be caused by missing system files or some issues with the Cortana program itself. And so if the SearchUI.exe file is not responding, then you wouldn’t be able to use the search feature of Cortana. But worry not for this post will walk you through fixing this problem. Before you troubleshoot the problem, you can try to restart your computer and see if it helps, if it doesn’t, then proceed to the given options below.

Option 1 – Try to run the Search and Indexing troubleshooter

You might also want to run the Search and Indexing troubleshooter in Windows 10 as it checks whether the settings for Cortana are in place and automatically corrects any issues if the update or software installation has changed the settings. To run it just click on the Start button and select Settings > Updates and Security > Troubleshoot. From there, select the Search and Indexing Troubleshooter.

Option 2 – Restart Cortana’s process in the Task Manager

Restarting Cortana’s process in the Task Manager could also help you resolve the problem. Refer to the steps given below to do so.

• Tap the Ctrl + Alt + Del keys to open the Security options window.
• From there, look for the Task Manager in the given list and open it.
• Next, look for the process of Cortana and right-click on it, and then select the End Task option to end its process.
• After that, the Cortana process will restart by itself and re-initialize.

Option 3 – Try resetting Cortana

• Open Cortana and go to the Settings section where you’ll see the “Turning off Cortana clears what Cortana knows on this device, but won’t delete anything from the Notebook. After Cortana is off, you can decide what you’d like to do with anything still stored in the cloud” option. Turn this option off.
• Restart your PC.
• After your computer boots, launch Cortana again and check.

Option 4 – Try running the DISM tool

You can try running the Deployment Imaging and Servicing Management or DISM tool to fix the Windows Upgrade problem. Using this built-in tool, you have various options such as the “/ScanHealth”, “/CheckHealth”, and “/RestoreHealth”.

• Open the Command Prompt with admin privileges.
• Then type in the following commands and make sure to hit Enter right after you type each one of them:
  • Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth
  • Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth
  • exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth
• Do not close the window if the process takes a while as it will probably take a few minutes to finish.

Option 5 – Try to reinstall Cortana

If none of the options given above works, you must consider reinstalling Cortana.

• First, right-click on the Start button and click on the Windows Powershell (Admin) option from the list.
• Next, type the following command and hit Enter to execute it:

Get-AppXPackage -Name Microsoft.Windows.Cortana | Foreach {Add-AppxPackage -DisableDevelopmentMode -Register "$($_.InstallLocation)AppXManifest.xml"}

• Restart your computer and check if Cortana is now able to connect.

Option 6 – Try troubleshooting the problem in a Clean Boot State

There are instances that some conflicting programs installed in your computer might be the one that’s causing some issues with Cortana or causing the SearchUI.exe process to stop. To identify which program is causing the problem, you need to put your computer in a Clean Boot State. To do so, follow the steps below.

• Log onto your PC as an administrator.
• Type in MSConfig in the Start Search to open the System Configuration utility.
• From there, go to the General tab and click “Selective startup”.
• Clear the “Load Startup items” check box and make sure that the “Load System Services” and “Use Original boot configuration” options are checked.
• Next, click the Services tab and select the “Hide All Microsoft Services” check box.
• Click Disable all.
• Click on Apply/OK and restart your PC. (This will put your PC into a Clean Boot State. And configure Windows to use the usual startup, just simply undo the changes.)
• From there, start to isolate the problem by checking which one of the programs you installed recently is the root cause of the problem.