Thanks Microsoft! Another present. At least this one has an answer (of sorts) in the knowledge base. Unfortunately if you read that article, you might be more confused than when you started.
First, the problem will generally manifest with a more detailed message in the log like “The account specified for this service is different from the account specified for other services running in the same process.” What that means in a nutshell is that the login credentials have a problem.
What they don’t tell you is how to fix the problem (not in a helpful way at any rate).
So what I found is that by setting the DNS Client Service to the Network Service account, it will start right up – and even though it might not match the other services that are using different accounts (like the local system account), it works just fine.
As to password, you might be mystified for a while – I certainly was. There actually is no password. Set it to blank and you’ll be set.