Windows 10 – The Dependency Service or Group Failed to Start

by May 19, 2016

This issue could be seen on other versions of Windows but in this case it was Windows 10. The wireless connection icon in the system tray has a yellow exclamation and says no internet. But! Google Chrome and Internet Explorer both work and you can browse the web. Only Microsoft Edge is unable to browse web pages and returns the error “Hmm, we can’t reach this page”. If you open In Network and Sharing Center you see a dependency error message when you expect to see the network listed as Public or Private.
There are a number of fixes returned in the search results for this error but I’m guessing you are here because none of those were your problem.

    To see if you have the same issue as I did

  • run services.msc
  • see if “Network Location Awareness” is running
  • If not, try to start it

If you get a dependency error then you might have the same problem I did. In my case the customer had disabled “Windows Event Log” service. Another dependency you can check is “DHCP Client” service. If either of those is set to Disabled you should change them to Automatic. Once you verify that you can start “Windows Even Log” and “DHCP Client” then try to start “Network Location Awareness” again. If it starts then you have most likely fixed your problem. Reboot and verify that you have been successful.