Themes Won't Finish Loading

frankma · 11 Mar 2019

Hello All,

This problem is driving me crazy. My themes launch but they freeze. See the attached screen shot. The side scroller on the right never appears, and what you see in the attachment is all I see forever unless I X it out.

Thus, I am unable to select a theme. Even if I click on any of the ones you see showing, nothing happens.

Hope someone can suggest something. I didn't try to change my theme for about 2 months I'd say, but prior to that never had any problems. Thank you for any suggestions.

Sincerely,
Frank

dalchina · 12 Mar 2019

Hi to separate OS corruption from user profile issues, can you please create a new user for test purposes, and then see if you can do that? Thanks.

Where did the themes come from? Is there any particular dependency, or are they ones you have saved yourself?

Check the state of this service:

Themes Won't Finish Loading-snap-2019-03-12-07.30.07.png

swarfega · 12 Mar 2019

You could try the Windows Store troubleshooter.

frankma · 12 Mar 2019

Hi thank you for responding. I made a new user account and the same thing happened. As well, when I tried to run the troubleshooter it said I needed a Microsoft Account. When I went through that procedure of logging in I got an error message and code so I couldn't run the troubleshooter.

My settings page to jump to the themes section takes about 15 seconds to launch and when I jump to themes the same thing is still happening. Thank you everyone.

dalchina · 13 Mar 2019

Hi, do you have a disk image you have created before this started? This forum frequently and continually urges users to use disk imaging routinely (e.g. Macrium Reflect - free - + external storage).

Those who do this can restore their PC to a previous working state in many - but not all- cases quite quickly and without technical help.

Otherwise, as we have no clue as to the history of your system, please do the following basic checks. This may take some time.
a. Check your disk: Hard disk sentinel (trial) gives the best instant report on its GUI I know. Else e.g. HD Tune (free), Health and Error scan tabs. Post the result.
To post a screenshot please use the Insert Image icon above your post.

b. If ok, from an admin command or Powershell prompt run
chkdsk c: /scan
and post the summary result.

c. If ok, from an admin command or Powershell prompt run
SFC /SCANNOW
and post the summary result.

What is your Windows build? Windows key + r, winver

Have you checked the status of your Themes service as in my post above?

frankma · 15 Mar 2019

Hello,

Sorry for the delay in my response I've been really busy this week. Attached is the Hard Disk Sentinel Results. Below is also the results of the scan commands you told me to run. My Themes service looks exactly like your example above.

My Windows Build is Version 1809 Build 17763.379

And one last thing, I did notice that if I take all of the Themes out of the folder where Windows stores them the Themes page launches fine. However, of course, I have no Themes listed.

Thank you for all your help.

Sincerely,

Frank

Microsoft Windows [Version 10.0.17763.379](c) 2018 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.C:\WINDOWS\system32>chkdsk c:/scanThe type of the file system is NTFS.Stage 1: Examining basic file system structure ... 1006068 file records processed.File verification completed. 10099 large file records processed. 0 bad file records processed.Stage 2: Examining file name linkage ... 2151 reparse records processed. 1246912 index entries processed.Index verification completed. 0 unindexed files scanned. 0 unindexed files recovered to lost and found. 2151 reparse records processed.Stage 3: Examining security descriptors ...Security descriptor verification completed. 120423 data files processed.CHKDSK is verifying Usn Journal... 37928816 USN bytes processed.Usn Journal verification completed.Windows has scanned the file system and found no problems.No further action is required.1952109000 KB total disk space.1191057360 KB in 633105 files. 395228 KB in 120424 indexes. 0 KB in bad sectors. 1177220 KB in use by the system. 65536 KB occupied by the log file. 759479192 KB available on disk. 4096 bytes in each allocation unit. 488027250 total allocation units on disk. 189869798 allocation units available on disk.C:\WINDOWS\system32>C:\WINDOWS\system32>C:\WINDOWS\system32>sfc /scannowBeginning system scan. This process will take some time.Beginning verification phase of system scan.Verification 100% complete.Windows Resource Protection did not find any integrity violations.C:\WINDOWS\system32>

Themes Won't Finish Loading-hard-disk-sentinel.jpg

frankma · 15 Mar 2019

Whoops I'm so sorry, see below.

Windows has scanned the file system and found no problems.No further action is required.1952109000 KB total disk space.1191057360 KB in 633105 files. 395228 KB in 120424 indexes. 0 KB in bad sectors. 1177220 KB in use by the system. 65536 KB occupied by the log file. 759479192 KB available on disk. 4096 bytes in each allocation unit. 488027250 total allocation units on disk. 189869798 allocation units available on disk.C:\WINDOWS\system32>C:\WINDOWS\system32>C:\WINDOWS\system32>sfc /scannowBeginning system scan. This process will take some time.Beginning verification phase of system scan.Verification 100% complete.Windows Resource Protection did not find any integrity violations.

dalchina · 16 Mar 2019

Hi, thanks, those are fine. Could you look at the 2nd and 3rd item of my post #2, and also post #3? Thanks.

frankma · 17 Mar 2019

Hello Again,

I downloaded 99% of the themes directly from Microsoft, way before this Microsoft App and Store nonsense started, and I stopped quite a bit before that. When the Themes were freely available directly from Microsoft without going through a bunch of hoops.

It has been probably well over a year since I downloaded a theme, and I have some old ones. For example, I have the 60's theme from Microsoft Plus (I think.)

All was fine up until a couple of months ago as I said.

And I do backup my system daily, full backup, but unfortunately, I do not have a backup that exists before I discovered this issue.

Lastly, do you have any idea how to get rid of this pesky weather program, the icon is in my taskbar and looks like a sun.

It got installed by accident, and this whole issue started right around that time.

Thank you again for everything.

dalchina · 17 Mar 2019

Is the themes service state ok? (post #2)?
Are you still experiencing this problem?

It's important all the themes are compatible with Win 10 of course. MS Plus is ancient, isn't it (vague memory..).

Weather program: if it's a UWP app from the store, then you should be able to uininstall it from the Start Menu.

If it's a traditional 'desktop' program - exe and dll's - then you could start from

Themes Won't Finish Loading-snap-2019-03-17-08.09.02.png

If it's one of those, free progs like Geek Uninstaller, Revo Uninstaller use the normal uninstaller, and then run a scan to pick up leftovers (deficiencies in the author's uninstaller).

Uninstall Apps in Windows 10 | Tutorials

And I do backup my system daily, full backup, but unfortunately, I do not have a backup that exists before I discovered this issue.

- note if you use disk imaging, you can keep a set of disk images, enabling you to restore to different dates; with the free version it's
base image (large); differential a; differential b; differential c; differential d;........differential x;
- where the differentials are on different dates. To restore an image use any differential- it will use the base image.

Macrium reflect maintains the set of images and limits them to the number you set.,

The commercial version also offers incremental images (smaller, faster - difference from last image created).

System Restore, if enabled, offers a different form of protection, but restoring is uncertain of success, alas.