[Win 7] Group Policy Client service not starting

[Tesla]

I had a laptop earlier that after a rebuild (win 7) and a plethora of updates (with numerous times windows update not able to cope) I was getting the message below (appearing in the notification bar)

 

Failed to connect to a windows service

Windows could not connect to the Group Policy Client service. This problem prevents standard users from logging on to the system.

As an administrative user, you can review the System Event Log for details about why the service didn't respond.

 

The eventvwr was useless, basically showing the same information as the notification. Found the article below, on the Microsoft Technet site, worked a charm!

 

There are two places to look in the registry:

1. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es this path should contain gpsvc key (a folder), which is responsible for service parameters and configuration. I found that the key was intact, so, you do not touch anything here - just check that the key exists.
   
2. HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\SVCHOST This is the most important path you should look into, as it must contain the keys and values referred in the key #1. Below are descriptions what must be present there.
   

 

• There must be Multi-String value called GPSvcGroup. My laptop was missing it. So, you should create multi-string value named GPSvcGroup and assign it value GPSvc.
  
• Next, you must create a key (a folder) and name it GPSvcGroup - this key normally should be there, but, again, it was missin on my laptop.
  
• Then open newly-created GPSvcGroup folder and create 2 DWORD values:
  

 

1. First called AuthenticationCapabilities and you must give it a value of 0x00003020 (or 12320 in decimal)
   
2. Second is called CoInitializeSecurityParam and it must have value of 1.
   

Once you complete all steps above, reboot the computer and the problem will be fixed.

 

Video Walkthrough is also helpful (one of the bullet points in section 2 is worded badly, video helped!) The same guy also has a video on fixing this same issue in Windows 8.

 

Link to article - https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/office/en-US/334756d1-eac0-4814-bf8e-28b89ce4d78c/group-policy-client-service-does-not-start?forum=winserverGP

Edited March 8, 2016 by Tesla