Lumia 950 not loading Start Screen or full App list

[ZombieXboxBlog]

My Lumia 950 started popping up some error notifications so I rebooted and it would only take me to a screen with the background image and a search bar across the top.

I messed around with it and somehow the People app appeared so I realised it's the App list. I pinned it to Start and the Start screen reappeared but only for the People app.

The strange thing is all the apps are still installed and can be found through the Store search. Notifications are even still showing up but weirdly have a code line above them too, e.g. WhatsApp shows 5319275A.WhatsApp_cv1g1gvan...etc etc.

I've tried Soft Reset, turning Airplane Mode on and off, taking the background image off and on, etc etc, nothing's working.

I'm incredibly loath to do a Hard Reset because it wipes me progress on Xbox apps, and although it sounds daft I'm quite far into a ridiculous grind achievement.

However, if I search for the app through the Store I can at least use the phone for stuff, but it's obviously not tenable in the medium term.

Any ideas or is this an obvious candidate for a hard reset?

UPDATE: I found I can install apps not already on the phone and it will appear in the app list and can be pinned to the Start menu. I just can't seem to pin existing apps to the Start menu - I can go into Twitter for instance but it crashes whenever I try to pin a list to the Start menu.

 

[Jackson Ombati]

Hi.
Hard Resetting is painful but I think the benefits associated with it are more important.
Regards,

Sent from mTalk

 

[ZombieXboxBlog]

Thanks for the replies, weirdly if an app updated it restored it to my App List. In the end I managed to pop the achievement I needed and did a hard reset and had everything back up and running within half an hour!