Question Days after Win 10 KB4586781 Update, upon computer restart all previous settings disappeared.

[conticreative]

Last week (November 17-2020) I update Windows 10 on my Desktop, then on my work laptop and finally on my Music Making laptop.

Until today (Sunday Nov. 22) everything worked fine, but I had to restart my Desktop after updating a program.
Upon restart, I was greeted by an almost completely default desktop and most, if not all, of my settings were gone.

Here is a list of things that were wrong off the top of my head:

• Desktop Background (I usually keep a solid color, this was the one with the windows logo)
• Desktop Icon sizes larger than usual.
• Some desktop icons were missing
• Taskbar was missing programs I use frequently
• Start menu was almost completely default except for ADOBE Suite Programs, but the rest of my carefully organized Start menu icons were gone.
• Photoshop was uninstalled, but all the other Adobe programs were there.
• Microsoft office was present but I wasn't logged in and could not launch MS word.
• Every single taskbar utility asked for their Settings file (where necessary, I have a distributed system where I keep OS in one drive, Docs, music, video etc, in a D drive, Apps settings elsewhere).
• Internet Download Manager and Directory Opus lost all my custom settings.
• Chrome wouldn't launch at all
• Vivaldi browser (which I use for its capability to run different profiles at the same time, was back to a basic installation
• Default Browser was set to Microsoft Edge. I never set Edge as default
• Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive and Adobe Cloud, all of which had custom folder location on my D drive, were now all located in a C:\TEMP folder
• Nvidia Drivers were not installed (along with almost all my Nvidia settings)

I am sure there was more of a mess than I could ascertain during my panicked inspection, so I decided to check my System Restore, where I found an automatic restore from right before I installed the last update.

I decided to try the restore, and while it took a much longer than usual, when it was done, I was back in my nold Windows the way it was until the latest restart
There were still a few weird things, like Chrome would not launch and some extensions were broken. I installed a new version and not only it worked fine, but was set to my preferences.

One good thing happened: Ever since I built this computer, it was unable to see itself in Network and did not show up on the other computers either.
Network would show every possible device in my network but not my desktop. To reach it I had to type \\COMPUTER-NAME and my shared folders would show up.
Apparently, that's not an issue anymore. The Desktop's Shared Folders now show in every computer and even my iPad. Very strange.

Now I have a bit of a dilemma. Under WINDOWS UPDATES I see the following:

Windows Update

Updates available
Last checked: Today, 10:34 AM

2020-11 Cumulative Update for Windows 10 Version 2004 for x64-based Systems (KB4586781) Status: Pending install
[Install now]

View optional updates
Feature update to Windows 10, version 20H2

The next version of Windows is here with new features and security improvements. Select "Download and install", and the update will begin after other updates in your queue have completed. Your device may need to restart.
[Download and install]

I am a bit leery of updating again, but I know that I have to.
I just created a new restore point and I was thinking of creating a new backup on a Thumbdrive.

What the hell happened to my computer? Why a week after the update? I had restarted at least twice since Nov. 17. It was only 5 days ago.
How should I proceed? What is the safest course?

For the record, I am going to backup the preferences for all my mission critical applications, like Directory Opus and others. That way if I am stuck with a new Win 10 installation, between my backups and the cloud drives I should be OK.
But if at all possible, I'd prefer to avoid the drama.

Thank you for your help.

 

[rgd1101]

did you not try just reboot before doing the restore?

 

[conticreative]

Yes, I did reboot, but it was still showing me a mostly new computer. Sorry I didn't list that. I was in a bit of a panic when I wrote the post.
I did read somewhere the often a reboot solves the problem, but it didn't for me.

As I mentioned, it's working now, but the updates are waiting in the wings and I have a lot of work to do.

One thing I did was to make my own restore point and I did a system backup on a thumb drive.
I also backed up all the settings I could think of on a cloud drive and I mapped all my custom locations in my Opus preferences (Opus is a Windows Explorer substitute with a kick ass set of features).

If I do have to start from scratch, it won't be the end of the world, but it will be annoying.

Thank you for the reply.