this post was submitted on 13 Nov 2023
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Yeah, basically that. I'm back at work in Windows land on a Monday morning, and pondering what sadist at Microsoft included these features. It's not hyperbole to say that the startup repair, and the troubleshooters in settings, have never fixed an issue I've encountered with Windows. Not even once. Is this typical?

ETA: I've learned from reading the responses that the Windows troubleshooters primarily look for missing or broken drivers, and sometimes fix things just by restarting a service, so they're useful if you have troublesome hardware.

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[โ€“] MrSlicer@lemmy.world 4 points 2 years ago

I was missing printer drivers it found the drivers (iirc)

[โ€“] atlasraven31@lemm.ee 4 points 2 years ago

Yes, a network issue fixed automatically. I was shocked as anyone.

[โ€“] Th4tGuyII@kbin.social 3 points 2 years ago

I can't say I've ever had a problem solved by any of the troubleshooters, yet I always go to them just in case one day they do.

Usually they either direct you to the most generic solutions possible (that you've already likely done by the time you're resorting to the troubleshooter), reset your networking (thanks Windows, I felt like having to reconnect to all my networks again) or come back saying they couldn't find a problem...

Which clearly isn't the case Microsoft, because if there wasn't a problem, why the fuck would I be using the troubleshooter? For the shits and giggles?

[โ€“] ares35@kbin.social 3 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

only once for startup repair, twice for system restore. all client systems, not mine, since the introduction of those features. one of those ended up needing a full backup and reinstall soon after anyway.

plus the one time shadow copies from automatic system restore points saved a client's cad, docs, images, pdfs, and other files from a poorly-executed ransomware attack (that failed to clear out those vss copies). a nirsoft utility was able to save everything.

the 'fixit' troubleshooters are nearly worthless.

[โ€“] ctobrien84@lemmy.world 3 points 2 years ago

Many times.

[โ€“] Toribor@corndog.social 3 points 2 years ago

It will sometimes wipe your static IP configuration and switch it to DHCP which could theoretically fix something, but I've only ever seen this break things instead.

[โ€“] Commiunism@lemmy.wtf 3 points 2 years ago

I would usually have issues with my wi-fi, where the connection after a reboot won't work and the wi-fi GUI would reset itself everytime i tried. Network troubleshooter would fix it 100% every time and quite quickly, so there was no reason to actually figure out what was at fault.

[โ€“] pat277@sh.itjust.works 2 points 2 years ago

I had it work once for a wifi issue that was caused by an update, during either Vista or Win7 era. Outside of that, it fixed an audio problem for Win10 on a single app.

[โ€“] oyenyaaow@lemmy.zip 2 points 2 years ago

I think it pointed out the right direction at least once, back when i was doing tech support (xp and pre-xp). Back when the toolkit includes whole stacks of cd's containing every driver known to exist. I don't even remember what it is, but it was something Realtek.

[โ€“] woodgen@lemm.ee 2 points 2 years ago

This would only be possible if it installed Linux.

[โ€“] Pantherina@feddit.de 2 points 2 years ago

It broke itselt, it broke Win2Usb and it broke grub. Thats it hahaa

[โ€“] amir_s89@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 years ago

I had a problem once when my laptop display was just black after booting. Triend everything, nothing worked. Return to OEM authorized support. They had my laptop for 4 weeks, so solution. Then just refunded the full price & retuned back the laptop.

Ubuntu LTS since then & no sick or weird issues since.

[โ€“] terminhell@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 2 years ago

Not that I've ever seen. It usually means it's time to reinstall.

[โ€“] OrekiWoof@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 years ago

both fixed things many times

[โ€“] rufus@discuss.tchncs.de 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

No. Tried it like 3-4 times in my life for really f-ed up not booting machines and it never worked for me. Haven't tried it since the ealy Win10 times, though.

[โ€“] Cannacheques@slrpnk.net 2 points 2 years ago

Nah more features and flexibility the better

[โ€“] mtchristo@lemm.ee 1 points 2 years ago

The HP help and troubleshooting software did better than the Microsoft one.

[โ€“] tofubl@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 2 years ago

Just been through the fire of having to clone my system to a new SSD and no, startup repair did nothing for me.

[โ€“] AnonTwo@kbin.social 1 points 2 years ago

I think it helped with a internet issue once, but I probably just needed to reset something.

I'm pretty sure it just does the absolute basic troubleshooting.

[โ€“] vivadanang@lemm.ee 1 points 2 years ago

had a couple of windows 2000 pro and server recovery saves. haven't thought about it since. hrmmm

[โ€“] Treczoks@lemm.ee 1 points 2 years ago

I had a number of occasions where Windows on my work PC f-ed up. None of the times, the windows "troubleshooting" wizard was anything but a waste of time before calling IT or digging into the problem myself.

[โ€“] YexingTudou@lemmy.ml 1 points 2 years ago

It used to fix WiFi issues for me back on Windows Vista (bleh). Vista would always have issues when I woke my laptop from sleep mode, and my WiFi would be disconnected and unable to reconnect/properly turn off. Running the troubleshooter would restart my wireless card. Other than that I haven't encountered anything it's helped, but I don't use windows too often these days.

[โ€“] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 children)

If the problem can be solved by a restart of that thing's service (audio, network, etc.) then it has fixed things for me in the past.

Pretty much no other solution (especially the running old games one) has ever worked in the troubleshooter without me having to tinker with it further.

[โ€“] SwingingTheLamp@midwest.social 2 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Oh, man, I may have to eat crow on this one! This reminds me how, at my previous job, the lousy HP printer driver would freeze up and stop printing. I could get it printing again by going into Services and re-starting the printer service. It was more convenient, and easier to train my staff, to just run the printing troubleshooter. It never reported a problem, but it did re-start the printer service, which fixed the immediate issue.

[โ€“] Rentlar@lemmy.ca 2 points 2 years ago

Moral of the story: Only an HP deals in absolutes.

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