Classic Shell: Forum

I had to do a major system restore to factory settings a month or so ago. Since then the machine always boots straight into Windows 8 start screen and the only way into Classic Shell is to hit a Classic Shell program shortcut. Then when I am in, the classic shell button will not show. The only way to get that is to go to Classic Shell Start Screen settings (which are fine) and hit enter and then it does.

Periodically, when I try to do something or find something, the screen will shift back to Windows 8 and ask me to do various Windows things, personalise, start it, whatever. I can get back to Classic Shell fairly easily from that but it is very annoying.

I have Windows 8 updates turned off completely so I only get the critical ones (and I wish I could stop them) and virus updates.

Any help, I'd be very grateful. Thanks.

If you did your System Restore to before Classic Shell was installed, some of its components may no longer be registered. Download the latest version from www.classicshell.net and install it.

Open Classic Start Menu Settings and make sure "Start automatically for this user" in turned on, on the General Behavior tab.

This should solve your problem but if the menu still does not start automatically, go to C:\Program Files\Classic Shell from File Explorer and right click ClassicStartMenu.exe, click Copy in the context menu. Then browse to C:\Users\<Your user name>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\Startup folder. Right click an empty area and click Paste shortcut.

Now your Classic Start Menu should start reliably at startup every time.

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Links to some general topics:

● Compare Start Menus

● Read the Search box usage guide.

I am a Windows enthusiast and helped a little with Classic Shell's testing and usability/UX feedback.