"Windows cannot find one of the files in this theme" annoying error

Dear All,

Has anyone come across this highly annoying error? Once I am in Settings/Personalisation/Themes page, a few secs after I have entered "Themes" page, I get this annoying ringtone and the error "windows cannot find one of the files in this theme, do you still want to save it?".

Whether I click "Yes, save it", or "No, don't save it", the error comes back...I can click again to "save" or not to save and this goes on for 15-18 times before it stops.

I am not sure whether this 15-18 times occurring means it's looking for 15-18 files one from each of the 18 themes, or whether 15-17 files are missing in general, or something else.

Each theme folder contain a folder labelled "DesktopBackground" (it contains the desktop pics), and also another file outside the desktop background folder (but inside the theme folder), which is a "windows theme file".

All theme folders have both the DesktopBackground folder as well as the windows theme file, so as far as I can tell with my limited IT knowledge, nothing appears to be missing..

I run Windows 2004, version 20175.1000 in the Dev ring, however I am carrying this error since before joining Windows insider...

So far, I have:

1. Moved out all individual themes from the Windows Themes folder, leaving only the default Microsoft ones. Error still continues even when I have selected the default Microsoft windows 10 theme (light or dark).

For reference, my themes folder is located in C:\Users\Username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Themes

2. I have de-sync the Themes synchronisation, but no joy. The moment I go back to "Themes" page, errors re-appear.

Even when all themes are present in the Windows themes folder, all themes appear normally in the Settings/Personalisation/Themes page as they should, and all desktop pics appear to work flawlessly. Hence, I can still select any of the themes and they all work OK, it's the annoying tone and the 15-17 times I have to cancel the error one after another that are so frustrating.

I have noticed that the error occurs a few sec after I enter the "Settings/Personalisation/Themes page"... it appears without me touching anything at all...the moment I enter "Setting/Personalisation/Themes" page, i get the 15-17 error messages, then I can go one level up to "Settings/Personalisation/Screensaver" (or down to say "Fonts"), then once I go back to "Themes" page, errors come back just by entering the "Themes" page alone and doing nothing other than visiting the page.

Has anyone found the root cause and a fix?

Thanks a lot,
Christos

- - - Updated - - -

Update:

After I temporarily "deleted" all themes from the "Themes" folder apart of the default Microsoft theme (and with errors still persisting), I logged into Microsoft store.

All themes that I had purchased were "ready for downloading". Each time I was selecting to download a theme, same error. I re-downloaded all purchased themes, they all went to the correct "Themes" directory, they all appear on the Themes setting page, and the error still persists.

Hi, you could try working through this:
Fix: Windows Cannot Find One of the Files in this Theme - Appuals.com

I've found the site is quite useful.

I have the Aero theme - not offhand sure if it's there as default, but reading this
Install Aerolite Theme in Windows 10
indicates it is.

rebuild the Windows App suite. I did use the command in Powershell...it started the process, I could clearly see it was rebuilding a lot of things but towards the end I started seeing a lot of red fonts with a few errors. I should had taken maybe a screenshot of this but didn't.

That doesn't sound good.

You might start considering checking your disk, running chkdsk, SFC /SCANNOW and in-place upgrade repair install- the usual routine.

Granted, assuming

Now, being in the Dev ring, my Windows 2004 version was just updated two days ago, so shouldn't this Win App suite been rebuilt from the Windows update and upgrade to a later version?

means the equivalent of a feature update, it doesn't seem to make sense if your disk and file system is intact.

C:\Users\Username\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Themes
- is where my custom theme is stored.

Aero is in
C:\Windows\Resources\Themes

Since I have just upgraded Windows to a later version, is there sense in running Windows repair/install? What difference does it make given that the system has just been upgraded?

As noted, not a lot...

You can confirm this- you said

however I am carrying this error since before joining Windows insider...

so I'm going to bet that if you were to create a new user for test purposes and log in as that user, you would not then experience this.

I.e. if so, it's specific to your user profile, and general Windows repairs would be irrelevant.

That still leaves the Powershell re-registration failure... see:
Reinstall and Re-register Apps in Windows 10
and note the first 2 options.

It's an assumption that any error you experience in trying to re-reregister apps is linked to the theme issue. Perhaps you can only prove that by having had the Powershell command succeed.

Without the error message can't say more. So try the Powershell command noting whether it needs to be run as admin or not from the tutorial and see what effect that has.

Considering
Cannot find path 'C:\AppManifest.xml' because it does not exist.
Does Store launch?

If not, as I suggested some time back, create a new user for test purposes, log in as that user and again check if the Store launches.

When logged in as that user, try re-registering just one app that fails as shown above for comparison.

You can also see if you get the same theme error or not.