While the very efficient & effective inbuilt Windows Troubleshooters in Windows are meant to make your life easy, what if they refuse to work properly, someday, for some reason!? If your Windows Troubleshooters are not working and you receive an error message – An error occurred while troubleshooting, A problem is preventing the troubleshooter from starting, then this post will help you fix the troubleshooting wizards in Windows 10/8/7.

A problem is preventing the troubleshooter from starting

If your Windows Troubleshooter has stopped working, does not start, is stuck or closes before completing its job, and maybe throws up error codes like 0x80070002, 0x8e5e0247, 0x80300113, 0x803c010b, etc, then this post will help you.

Windows Troubleshooters not working

You are aware that you can see all the built-in Windows Troubleshooters at the following location:

Control Panel\All Control Panel Items\Troubleshooting\All Categories

In Windows 10 you can access them via the Settings Troubleshooters page:

An error occurred while troubleshooting

If when you try to run a Troubleshooter, you receive the following error message – An error occurred while troubleshooting, A problem is preventing the troubleshooter from starting, then try these suggestions. If they are unable to run or never work, well, here are a few general steps you may want to try out to troubleshoot the Windows Troubleshooters.

1] Run System Restore

See if a System Restore helps you.

2] Run System File Checker

Click Start >Search Menu Bar >cmd >rt click on result > Run As Administrator > Type sfc /scannow > Hit Enter. This will run the System File Checker. This will examine all your system files and replace them if any are found to have been corrupted. Reboot when asked. Alternatively, simply download FixWin and click the Run System File Checker button.

3] Check Service status

Open Services Manager and ensure that the Cryptographic Service is Started and set to Automatic.

4] Log in as Administrator

Try using the Troubleshooters when logged on as a new Administrator user.

5] Use alternative Troubleshooting

If it’s your online troubleshooters which are failing, try a local troubleshooter. It’s possible that there may be issues with the connection to the site where you download the online troubleshooters

6] Run Disk Cleanup

It could even be an issue with the files being stored in %temp% folder/s. Run Disk Cleanup utility to clear temp and junk files.

7] Check Logs

The troubleshooting reports, logs & other data are saved in the following locations:

%LocalAppData%\Diagnostics : It contains folders for the previously run troubleshooter.
%LocalAppData%\ElevatedDiagnostics : It contains folders for each troubleshooter which was Run as Administrator.
Windows Logs/Application
Applications and Services Logs/ Microsoft/ Windows/ Diagnosis-Scripted/ Admin
Applications and Services Logs/ Microsoft/ Windows/ Diagnosis-ScriptedDiagnosticsProvider/ Operational
Applications and Services Logs/ Microsoft/ Windows/ Diagnosis-Scripted/ Operational

See if anything there helps you.

TIP: See this post if you receive An unexpected error has occurred, The troubleshooting wizard can’t continue message with error code 0x8E5E0247, 0x803c010a, 0x80070005, 0x80070490, 0x8000ffff, 0x80300113, etc.

While this eventuality may never arise, should it, hope some of these general suggestions are of help to someone, someday.

This post will help you if Microsoft Fix It or Automated Troubleshooting Package is not working on your Windows computer.