Windows 10 lock screen not displaying clock or slideshow

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https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-start-winpc/windows-10-lock-screen-slideshow-not-showing/01975f7f-11e8-457e-a8ef-5b494af135f1

IsJustaGhost replied on 

If [win]+L is pressed for the first time after login, the lock screen works properly. Pressing [win]+L after that brings up a what appears to be the sign-in screen background overlaying the slideshow. This is why there is no clock or anything else displayed. The sign-in screen background is covering it up. If I wait several seconds before bring up the sign-in screen (it takes several seconds before the slide show begins, as stated before) the slideshow image will flash in view as the sign-in screen appears. The slide show is playing behind the sign-in screen background. 

Turning off "Show lock screen background picture on sign-in screen" causes a screen of only the current accent color to be displayed. However, if i close lockapp.exe from the task manager and than pres [win]+L, the lock screen appears normally. Though locking the computer after that sign on will once again show only the blank sign-in background.

I have tried everything i have found to solve this problem. Including using a transparent image as the background image in order to not have an unwanted image as the initial background for the slideshow. what am I to do if the slideshow is playing under the blank sign-in background(image or accent color, no user picture or sign--in block)?

This is a new laptop running Windows 10 Home preinstalled.

Version 10.0.16299 Build 16299. 

Note that when i press any button or click on the screen the sign-in area appears, this gif is in real time using keys such as [win]+L to shorten the process when possible because it's easier than the touchpad.

and one more side note for anyone who may want to do a gif, screentogif. got it for this, free and easy and a lot of options.

IsJustaGhost replied on 

I ended up doing a system restore from 3 days prior which seams to have fixed the problem. But that leaves the question as to what would cause such interference with the lock screen so that doing a recovery would not be necessary. I has hoping to solve this by other means so that others having the same issue may as well. Especially those who do not have a recent recovery point. I've currently set up auto restore points to be made every 2 days, just in case. I've been trying Revo Uninstaller as an uninstaller which shows that it makes a recovery point at the beginning of uninstalling an app. Unfortunately during this issue I've noticed that there have been no restore points created except for the one i created myself. Perhaps it's not compatible with windows 10's wmic.

Back to the issue. For those that are having an issue with a default image showing before the slideshow starts, try turning off "Show lock screen background picture on the sign-in screen". if that doesn't work use a transparent gif. Both should give you a single color background of the current accent color before the slideshow starts

If you see no clock, the lock screen is likely being "covered" by a hanging sign-in screen window background (at least that's what it seems to be). The selected image will flash into view when the sign-in screen is initiated by pressing a button, touching the screen or clicking. And killing the lock screen app, "LockApp.exe", in the task manager will let the lock screen function properly for a single time. This of course is not an answer to this problem. I hate to say it, but the only option may be to restore the system from a restore point. If that doesn't fix it than the issue may be present in that restore point as well. An earlier one, perhaps. If not a complete system recovery may be needed. 

Such a small issue to warrant such drastic actions. This is why we need to know what could cause this issue so that it could be fixed easily, if not internally so that it doesn't happen.

IsJustaGhost replied on 

OK, It's back to doing it. I can't place if it has anything to do with processor priority or not. It was a thought since it had worked before opening anything. But since I posted my last message it had done it again. so I tried idling a bit before locking to see if that helped. After several attempts it worked i logged in and opened explorer than locked and back to no clock. But it's more random now after i did the restore. It does, however, do it repeatedly. Unfortunately the random is for when it works. 

I'm going to replicate when it works. 

IsJustaGhost replied on 

Well, for the devs. I found that doing the following works.

  • [win]+L
  • blank screen. no clock. no weather. just blank (no background image because I have that turned off in the lock screen setting).
  • initiate login (pressing any key, mouse click, touch slide up - without animation)
  • wait for sign-in screen to timeout
  • normal lock screen with clock and slideshow appear

However, when I bring up the sign-in screen after that meathod, it comes up with the on-screen numpad. It doesn't normally come up.

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The exact same thing happens to me.

Maybe nobody report it because they all see a blank screen :)

In fact it took me a while before I noticed it. I think I had never cared about Cortana on the lock screen, the clock, or the app details. But I figured it out when I was wondering why my lock screen slide show didn't work.

It also works randomly for me. I tried disabling all the app details (weather, emails, skype, alarms etc...) and the Cortana suggestions. Maybe I should give a try at disabling completely Cortana, it may be related.

This issue also has a UX impact when using a touch screen: from the lock screen, to access the login, one has to slide up. It is obvious to understand that the gesture is "slide up" when you see the text, because it moves along with the gesture. But when you don't see it, you don't have any clue about the proper gesture.

Of course, as a developer, I'm a bit afraid about the stability of the whole system, if such a simple feature can be so unstable.

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It's like a z-order problem, where the slideshow window is being displayed beneath the static lock screen image window.  Perhaps there is a race in the logic to display the lock screen and slideshow window when Win+L is hit, and the race does not occur (or is much more rare) when the screen timeout occurs.

If I do not hit Win+L, but let the screen timeout normally, the slideshow plays (with clock display) every time.  If I hit Win+L, there is about a 20% chance that the clock and slideshow will display, otherwise I get the static lock screen image.  If I hit a key while the static lock screen is up, the lock screen image disappears and I can see the slide show briefly before the login prompt is displayed. 

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Having the exact same problem here as described by IsJustAGhost above.  This is terrible and persistent across system restores and more.  I'm betting there is a registry hack or clearing that needs to occur to fix it, but it does not seem to be something that can be worked around.  Fix please Microsoft!

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Been having the same problem. When I click and the static lock screen goes to show the sign in option there is a brief moment where it shows the slideshow, so it definitely is there, it is just somehow being overwritten by the base picture.

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As far as I can tell, this is not related to the OS. The lock screen is a separate running app called LockApp. Oddly though, as far as I can recall, I didn't notice the issue last month. Leading me to believe the issue had been resolved. However, it has been occurring most of this month ass well. For me, the issue happens whether I press [WIN]+L or allow it to lock at timeout.  I do not see this as a catastrophic issue to Windows 10, though i expect proper functionality to such a main-steam application. I have other irritations and disappointments with Windows 10 that I consider higher.

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We have noticed the same issue and have yet to come to a resolution.

We are running 1803 and have been able to replicate this issue on multiple machines now and have come across the following observations.

This issue does not appear to occur when the lock screen background is set to Windows Spotlight or Picture and only occurs when set to Slideshow. The issue appears to be happening when LockApp.exe process becomes suspended while using Slideshow for the lockscreen. Once it has become suspended this issue occurs also for Windows Spotlight or Picture lockscreen options.

Watching the LockApp.exe process with perfmon we have noticed some interesting points. Once running LockApp.exe becomes suspended after using a Slideshow lockscreen the process is unable to be resumed which may the cause of this issue? The only resolution is then to kill the process and then the lockscreen behaves as normal until LockApp.exe is suspended next.

While this might only be a minor issue we will look at locking down the Lock Screen options in GP to prevent service calls when we go to roll out to the wider organisation.

I hope any of these observations helps lead to a resolution!

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Guys,

This has now become consistent on every new machine I build.  It does not matter which "Creators Update" version I run including the new 1803, it does not matter what hardware configuration I'm running, the slideshow consistently does not work anymore when the screen is locked either explicitly with 'Win'+L or by letting the screensaver timeout elapse.  I would imagine that this is a persistent, across the board bug on all machines with the latest updates to Windows 10, and it is simply unacceptable that MS has not resolved this bug (or even recognized it here in the forums as a problem they will fix in the future) at this point.

Microsoft - what gives?

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Exact same issue here.  I wish I had something more useful to contribute, but it's just everything everyone else has said with no solution.  Just throwing in my hand to see if Microsoft will notice this.

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 I have spent the last 4 hours (no kidding) trying to understand this problem. This post perfectly summarises everything that is happening to me, I can't believe Google did not show it in the last 20+ searches I've done on the topic. Hope they'll fix it soon.

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I'm back to MacOS. Not because of this bug, but this is a representative bug. I like the Windows 10 experience (especially with touch screens). And Microsoft new initiatives have made me hope for the best: they have decided to take the advice of their users into account through a feedback tracker. They reorganized their teams to be more efficient. They took great initiatives to improve the developer experience under Windows, mainly though the partnership with Canonical (WSL), the Docker support, etc...

But each time they miss the point. Each time, a few details aren't solved, making these features perfectible. Still Microsoft teams mark them as functional, advertise around them, and ignore the further comments the users could have, even in their feedback tracker. They don't finish the job.

This feature is a good example of how Microsoft doesn't really care about people's advice. A bug is clearly identified, reproducible, on which some people have even begun to investigate, and not a single folk from Microsoft to say at least "hey, thanks for the report, we'll put a fix development in our backlog."

And if such a trivial feature can't be solved, it doesn't make me confident when it comes to the resolution of the issues I wait for a long time concerning development tools. And I also simply can't trust the code that operates WIndows 10 in general. Is it really performing well? Optimized? Reliable? Modern? Trustworthy?

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Last updated March 4, 2024 Views 20,303 Applies to: