Location services button greyed out

Hello, BobInOhio

Welcome to the Microsoft Community.

Thank you very much for your feedback. I have carefully read the information and problem description you provided. You mentioned that the location service is turned off in the settings, but you still receive the prompt to allow location access.

I understand the confusion caused by this problem. It is really frustrating to encounter such a problem. The location service button is grayed out, which usually means that some settings or policies of the system prevent the change of this function. I suggest you check it in the registry or group policy.

Method 1. Check the group policy settings (for Professional and Enterprise editions)

Press Win + R, enter gpedit.msc and press Enter.

In the left pane, expand "Computer Configuration" -> "Administrative Templates" -> "Windows Components" -> "Location and Sensors".

Double-click the "Turn off Windows Location Provider" setting in the right pane.

Make sure this policy is set to "Not Configured" or "Disabled".

Also check other related policy settings, such as "Turn off location platform", and make sure they are turned off or not configured.

Method 2. Check registry settings

Press Win + R, type regedit and press Enter.

In the Registry Editor, navigate to the following path:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\LocationAndSensors

Make sure the following values ​​are set correctly:

DisableLocation: should be set to 0 or deleted (if it exists).

Disclaimer: Modifying the registry or workgroup is usually for advanced users, administrators and IT professionals. It can help fix some problems. However, improper registry modification may cause serious problems. Therefore, please follow the steps below carefully. For further protection, back up the registry before modifying it. For more information on how to back up and restore the registry, refer to: How to back up and restore the registry in Windows - Microsoft Support

Method 3. Uninstall updates and restore the system

After three consecutive forced restarts (holding down the power button during Windows startup until the computer turns off), the system will automatically enter WinRE.

After entering WinRE, you will see a selection screen.

Select the Troubleshoot option.

In the Troubleshoot interface, select Advanced Options.

In Advanced Options, select System Restore. This will launch System Restore.

The System Restore tool will display the available restore points. Select a restore point with a date before the problem occurred.

Click Next and follow the prompts to complete the restore process.

You can also try uninstalling updates to test whether the black screen problem persists. The steps are as follows.

In Advanced Options, select Uninstall Updates.

You will see two options: Uninstall the latest quality update and Uninstall the latest feature update.

If you select Uninstall the latest quality update, the system will be rolled back to the state before the last quality update was installed.

If you select Uninstall the latest feature update, the system will be rolled back to the version before the feature update.

Best regards

Brian - Microsoft Community Support Specialist

I used option Method 2 and deleted the entry Disable Location and this solved the problem.

Many thanks.

I did the same and it worked for me too - after months of trying other methods!

Thanks.

I used option Method 2 and deleted the entry Disable Location and this solved the problem.

Many thanks.

Thank you for your quick reply

Yes, if the problem disappears after you uninstall the update, you may have encountered a potential problem. Since 24H2 was released recently, it may still have some problems, which requires Microsoft and users to work together to gradually solve these problems.

But unfortunately, we are not Microsoft employees, we are just participants in this public Microsoft community, so for us, we need to submit the problems we find in the feedback center provided by Microsoft. Please wait for Microsoft's further fixes, which may take some time. Microsoft may fix this problem in a future update patch.

Please submit your problem through the feedback center (if it is convenient, please provide as much detail as possible, including pictures, videos, etc.), where the development team will see your problem directly and may respond to your suggestions. Detailed steps can be found in the following link

Send feedback to Microsoft with the Feedback Hub app - Microsoft Support

Thank you for your patience and understanding.

I hope this information is helpful. If you have any questions, please let me know and I will be happy to provide you with further assistance.

Best regards

Brian - Microsoft Community Support Specialist

Brian,

Thanks for your help. I did option 3 and it's running perfectly again. I had suspected this recent update caused these problems. There were additional problems I noticed along with the location button being greyed out and those issues have been fixed now that I uninstalled the latest updates.

My concern now is when I install the next update, will this happen again? This has to be a known problem that I hope gets fixed.