i have a customer who uses #windows 10, and they said they couldn't reach the internet anymore: all they got was a big black box. turns out, they actually use the taskbar search box to type web addresses, and the search results popup is what went blank. simple fix: reboot the pc.

there's no permanent solution for that because, since #windows 8, microsoft cheated to get decent startup and shutdown times: the fast startup feature.

when you tell windows to shut down, it goes into a hybrid sleep/hibernation state instead, & the next startup is basically a wake-up instead of a true kernel startup.

reboots don't do that. windows goes through a proper shut-down & actual startup.

go long enough without a proper reboot, & windows does strange things. this is one.