yep.. its relatively painless- I've just done it myself in fact. Quite quick with a SSD.
You could try a new user profile if you were prepared to move to one should that work..
This might work (Powershell, admin):
Get-appxpackage -all *shellexperience* -packagetype bundle |% {add-appxpackage -register -disabledevelopmentmode ($_.installlocation + “\appxmetadata\appxbundlemanifest.xml”)}
Otherwise:
Precede it with this in case sthg has happened to your file system:
Windows key + X, click command prompt (admin)
chkdsk C: /F
Make sure the result is clear or fixed.
An In-place upgrade repair install will fix many things, but not those where the settings are not changed by the procedure.
For this you need an installation medium with the same base build as you have installed.
Repair Install Windows 10 with an In-place Upgrade - Windows 10 Forums
This will refresh Windows, after the manner of a Windows installation.
- all/most associations will be unchanged
- all your programs will be left installed
- you will lose any custom fonts
- you will lose any customised system icons
- you may need to re-establish your Wi-Fi connection
- you will need to redo Windows updates subsequent to the build you have used for the repair install
- Windows.old will be created
- system restore will be turned off- you should turn it on again and I recommend you manually schedule a daily restore point.
- you will need to redo any language downloads including the display language if you changed that)
- inactive title bar colouring (if used) will be reset to default
- if Qttabbar is installed, you need to re-enable it in explorer (Options, check Qttabbar)
This is one of the better features of Win10: as each major build comes out, that's your updated reference build, and as updates are mostly cumulative, there will be few to do.
Recommendation:
Before you perform this major repair procedure, do create a disk image.
Please consider using disk imaging regularly. It's a brilliant way to
- preserve your system (and your sanity)
- back up your data
- restore your system to a previously working state in a relatively short time
Recommended: Macrium Reflect or Aomei Backupper (free) + their boot disk/device + large enough external storage medium.