Windows 2019 RDS Servers Start Menu Stopped Working

Paul Allan 11

We are also running a 2019 RDS Farm and we have had this exact same issue with the Start Menu not working this week. Initially it was on one host, and now it is happening on two hosts! We ran the command on one host and it has fixed it. We have not ran it on the second host yet, as we had to stop it taking connections as it was causing so many issues for users.

Get-AppXPackage -AllUsers | Foreach {Add-AppxPackage -DisableDevelopmentMode -Register "$($_.InstallLocation)\AppXManifest.xml"}

Does MS know why this is happening? Has a Jan update caused this issue? It is very worrying since most of our staff are currently WFH and are relying on the RDS servers to be able to work effectively.

Many Thanks
Paul.

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Paul Allan 11 Reputation points

2021-02-04T10:41:45.37+00:00

And it is broken again already after about 30 mins. Seeing these errors logged:
Unable to start a DCOM Server: Microsoft.Windows.ShellExperienceHost_10.0.17763.1_neutral_neutral_cw5n1h2txyewy!App as Unavailable/Unavailable. The error:
"0"
Happened while starting this command:
"C:\Windows\SystemApps\ShellExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\ShellExperienceHost.exe" -ServerName:App.AppXtk181tbxbce2qsex02s8tw7hfxa9xb3t.mca

Unable to start a DCOM Server: Microsoft.Windows.Cortana_1.11.6.17763_neutral_neutral_cw5n1h2txyewy!CortanaUI as Unavailable/Unavailable. The error:
"0"
Happened while starting this command:
"C:\Windows\SystemApps\Microsoft.Windows.Cortana_cw5n1h2txyewy\SearchUI.exe" -ServerName:CortanaUI.AppXa50dqqa5gqv4a428c9y1jjw7m3btvepj.mca
Anonymous

2021-04-09T15:36:01.12+00:00

I've been troubleshooting similiar issues and I found this post that windows search is corrupting the user edb on server 2019 because the edb is moved to the appdata\roaming folder which is abruptly removed while the indexer is still accessing it. Maybe this is causing your issues too. Their solution was to create a scheduled task to restart the Windows search service on a user logout event ID.

https://jkindon.com/2020/03/15/windows-search-in-server-2019-and-multi-session-windows-10/
Brien Malone 1 Reputation point

2021-04-30T15:35:05.63+00:00

Thank you for posting this. Your reinstall the appx manifest fix did the trick for us. We were struggling with this one and were close to reverting to an earlier snapshot of the server. You saved us a lot of hassle. For what it's worth, our windows search is actually disabled on the affected server, so I don't think that was the cause in our case.
Ryan B Cooley 51 Reputation points

2025-04-11T19:19:21.1733333+00:00

Unfortunately, in 2025, this is still a problem.
Dan 5 Reputation points

2025-04-25T20:07:42.39+00:00

Same here. This issue has re-appeared following March Windows updates.
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6 answers

Anonymous

2021-02-05T02:42:08.823+00:00

HI

How about adding the following commands to the users login script:
Add-AppxPackage -Register "C:\Windows\SystemApps\ShellExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\AppxManifest.xml" -DisableDevelopmentMode
Add-AppxPackage -Register "C:\Windows\SystemApps\Microsoft.Windows.Cortana_cw5n1h2txyewy\AppxManifest.xml" -DisableDevelopmentMode

Thanks
Karlie
Was this answer helpful?
Anonymous

2021-02-24T03:02:12.737+00:00

Hi,

We have not heard from you for several days, any update?

Thanks
Karlie

Anonymous

2021-03-04T03:27:54.923+00:00

Hi @Paul Allan

Have you checked if below answers help?
If they are helpful, please do not forget to accept the answers.

Thanks

Thomas 1 Reputation point

2022-01-28T08:22:46.697+00:00

I just wanted to say that this solved the issue in my case, for now.

I'm guessing I have to make a loginscript that runs it.

Disappointing that it's nessesary. Three new Server 2022 RDS.