Windows Update won't update

[Poppa_Meth]

Sounds like you should be on SP1 if updates are good into February. Try the September Rollup. This is a cumulative update package for Win7 SP1. I had a slew of PCs all come in at once, all unable to do updates. After trying all the standard fixes, which usually work, but did not this time, I stumbled across this. After successfully installing the Rollup, WU started working again, though it was certainly still slow the first time I ran it.

[sneaker]

The September rollup is only 60 MB, the convenience rollup from May is 480 MB. So the September rollup isn't fully cumulative - Microsoft is still changing things. From what I understand Microsoft wants to include more and more into these rollups in the future until they may eventually have one actually cumulative rollup every month.

[Poppa_Meth]

I guess it may not be possible to have one big cumulative update because the download size would get ridiculous. Maybe the May one is like a bi-annual and is required for monthly rollups after that.

[aedipuss]

for anyone using win7 or 8.1 that is having problems with windows updates after a clean install m$ a couple days ago admitted it and a way to get it working. http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-update/windows-7-update-sol...0-7f5096b36d0c

[Seeker47]

I want to look into the catalog and the WUSOffline thing: there must be multiple ways to skin this cat. For the office machine I had mentioned, I made a list of the pending KBs -- that is, when MS Update told me they numbered 14 and listed them, though shortly after that it contradicted itself, telling me there were none, then completely hung on further checking. I went to the page for each KB on that list, nearly all of which could be downloaded individually. Then I double-clicked on the Sept. Cumulative Security Update for IE 11 that I had downloaded, and it installed. Call that a 'Proof of Concept.' However, doing that for KB after KB would become rather tedious, and is not really a fix for the underlying problem.

[Seeker47]

for anyone using win7 or 8.1 that is having problems with windows updates after a clean install m$ a couple days ago admitted it and a way to get it working. http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-update/windows-7-update-sol...0-7f5096b36d0c

Does this apply to sudden problems, a year or two after your clean install ?

[Seeker47]

I have been at a loss, trying to find any consistent governing principle, any rhyme or reason to this problem. (However, it must be acknowledged that I'm dealing with Win 7 -- either Pro, or Ultimate, or Enterprise, in some cases 32-bit and in others 64 bit, across rather different hardware. So, that could provide plenty of variables right there.) As I previously mentioned, this includes two boxes that have mysteriously (?) remained largely unaffected by this problem, including one that is frozen at IE-9, calling into question the statement that IE-11 is a requirement for continued updates. I have gone through many of the remedies suggested in this thread, plus various others I found online. For the 7 Pro x64 box that remains the most immediate and important case, the situation continues at an impasse. I thought that I had demonstrated a (cumbersome) workaround, of downloading individual KBs and force - applying them locally. I tried that with the most recent IE-11 cumulative security update, applied at the end of one workday, and which I thought had "taken" on the system. When I returned the next day, it was nowhere to be found in the list on "Update History" or "Installed Updates." So it did not actually work. (I think there may be an error message I need to reproduce here for you . . . )

If no update can be forcibly applied locally -- for whatever reasons -- it may be 'Game Over.' It seems that should also apply to the newer rollups format too, no ? But I don't want to go that route anyway, as it relinquishes too much control.

In the meantime, I ran the MS Update Troubleshooter, something I had done before (to little avail) on other boxes. Will try to attach snapshots of what came up.



It is possible this provides some of the answer, now, as this very bad news suggests (Paragraph 6):

http://www.forbes.com/sites/gordonkelly/2016/08/18/microsoft-windows-7-and-windows-8-g...s-10-upgrades/

Has anyone reading this applied any individual (non-rollup) patches after 10/31 ? If so, what edition of 7 were you running ? I haven't done so over the last several days, but I will check -- that is, on those boxes that were still updating. Of course, this explains nothing re the 7 Pro box that stopped updating in mid-Sept. -- or several others.

[aedipuss]

afaik microsoft is only doing "rollup" updates for win7 that contain all updates for the month in 1 file. that's what i got this month. no choice as to what you want or don't want to install.

[raffriff42]

no choice as to what you want or don't want to install.

In that case, my choice is "do not want." From the article:

Microsoft is removing two of the great distinguishing features of Win7/8.1 — granularity of updates and the ability to control them — while opening Win7 and 8.1 to the same snooping features that are in Win10. Is resistance futile?

[Poppa_Meth]

When I was having all these issue I ran the MS Update Troubleshooter many times to no avail. I was then recommended to try the Upgrade assistant to prep the system for upgrade to Windows 10. I didn't actually upgrade it, but evidently the Upgrade Assistant has a much more robust troubleshooter than the standalone version and works for a lot of people where the Update Troubleshooter does not.

[joecass]

I have been at a loss, trying to find any consistent governing principle, any rhyme or reason to this problem. (However, it must be acknowledged that I'm dealing with Win 7 -- either Pro, or Ultimate, or Enterprise, in some cases 32-bit and in others 64 bit, across rather different hardware. So, that could provide plenty of variables right there.) As I previously mentioned, this includes two boxes that have mysteriously (?) remained largely unaffected by this problem, including one that is frozen at IE-9, calling into question the statement that IE-11 is a requirement for continued updates. I have gone through many of the remedies suggested in this thread, plus various others I found online. For the 7 Pro x64 box that remains the most immediate and important case, the situation continues at an impasse. I thought that I had demonstrated a (cumbersome) workaround, of downloading individual KBs and force - applying them locally. I tried that with the most recent IE-11 cumulative security update, applied at the end of one workday, and which I thought had "taken" on the system. When I returned the next day, it was nowhere to be found in the list on "Update History" or "Installed Updates." So it did not actually work. (I think there may be an error message I need to reproduce here for you . . . )

If no update can be forcibly applied locally -- for whatever reasons -- it may be 'Game Over.' It seems that should also apply to the newer rollups format too, no ? But I don't want to go that route anyway, as it relinquishes too much control.

In the meantime, I ran the MS Update Troubleshooter, something I had done before (to little avail) on other boxes. Will try to attach snapshots of what came up.


[Attachment 39270 - Click to enlarge]
[Attachment 39271 - Click to enlarge]
[Attachment 39272 - Click to enlarge]

It is possible this provides some of the answer, now, as this very bad news suggests (Paragraph 6):

http://www.forbes.com/sites/gordonkelly/2016/08/18/microsoft-windows-7-and-windows-8-g...s-10-upgrades/

Has anyone reading this applied any individual (non-rollup) patches after 10/31 ? If so, what edition of 7 were you running ? I haven't done so over the last several days, but I will check -- that is, on those boxes that were still updating. Of course, this explains nothing re the 7 Pro box that stopped updating in mid-Sept. -- or several others.

Yes, I did apply ONE update after 10-31 on a Win 7 Ultimate laptop, but it was only a simple Windows Defender update. I've found that on just about every O.S. I use, there are problems with Windows Updates. I run different systems to be able to use older software that's not compatible with the next gen O.S., i.e., XP, Vista, 7, 8.1 and 10. All 32 bit versions. However, one box I use occasionally, a 2009 Dell Vostro running Windows 7 Pro, ALWAYS gave me problems with updates. The kicker... "updates are managed by your System Adminstrator".... which in this case, I guess is Dell, since they built the computer. Drove me crazy until I started to use "Microsoft Update" instead of "Windows Update". Recently, this new 'rollup' download didn't work either on any of my Win 7 systems. IMHO, all this crap started when the Insider Preview of Windows 10 became available in 2015. The normal 10-15 minute wait for updates took hours. Once the "free" Windows 10 update ended in July, things seemed to improve somewhat, but not back to the levels of 2 -3 years ago. On Vista through 10, I use Windows Gadgets in order to watch the CPU and Memory meter; on each desktop or laptop where Windows Update was not working, the CPU meter was pinned at 50%. This was driving me nuts..... on the machines where Update was working, once the updates were installed, then the CPU meter showed a much lower reading. There's something called 'svchost' process that eats up CPU and Memory cycles without mercy. If disabled, you can't get on line properly, so disabling svchost is not the answer. What I HAVE tried on several machines, is to Run MSCONFIG, Services, and disable Windows Updates. Then re-boot, go back to MSCONFIG, enable the updates, and change the update settings to Download Windows Updates Automatically. Once I'm able to get updates, I go back and disable them once again, until I feel like being bothered with this complete nonsense. The only O.S. that seems to perform updates religiously is Windows 10 ( Pro 32 bit ). But even then, on one desktop I set up specifically for Win 10, several times the machine just hung for an hour while applying the O.S. update.
It DOWNLOADED the update, but hung on the install.....three times, to where I just shut it off and forgot about it. NONE of the Microsoft 'fixes' work, including the now-defunct Mr. Fixit, which never fixed anything. None of the registry solutions I read about worked either, although I didn't try ALL of them. None of the suggestions on the Microsoft Support page worked, either. It's a mystery, and basically a hit-or-miss proposition. You should be able to find I.E. 11 somewhere on line, if you can, download and install it, if possible. I'm not familiar with 64 bit systems, so I can't vouch for any suggestions that I've tried on 32 bit. I do know the fresh installs of 32 bit and 64 bit Windows 7 are quite different from each other in how the O.S.'s are configured.

[joecass]

Download for Windows 7 X64 Internet Explorer 11:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/Internet-Explorer-11-for-Windows-7-details.aspx?id=40902

[Seeker47]

no choice as to what you want or don't want to install.

In that case, my choice is "do not want." From the article:

Microsoft is removing two of the great distinguishing features of Win7/8.1 — granularity of updates and the ability to control them — while opening Win7 and 8.1 to the same snooping features that are in Win10. Is resistance futile?

We're in complete agreement here. If that is the only choice, I will abandon the patches via Win Update entirely, just relying on regular boot partition images and my anti-malware programs. This is no joke: patches have been withdrawn by MS with little if any comment because they were bad; I've run into MS Updates that were fatal to one rig or another, on more than a few occasions. When that happened, the only recourse might be to wipe, and hope that last boot image was recent enough that we did not lose anything too important.

The issue re continued availability of specific, individual updates still appears to be in some dispute. The answer may vary, depending on which edition of Win . . . or even on some computers but not others. Another key, as yet unanswered question is what has been going on with the single KBs that I downloaded, but which would not apply by double-clicking on them -- something that I think generally used to work.

[Addendum: I just selected 3 out of 13 pending "important" updates for a box running 32-bit W7 Ent., and installed them quickly with no issues, through Win Update. But that really does not prove anything: some of these articles said that the Enterprise ed. was exempt from the new, post 10/31 rules -- at least for the time being. That may include being exempt from the "rollups only" thing as well. Lower editions won't have the benefit of that. (?)]

[Seeker47]

Yes, I did apply ONE update after 10-31 on a Win 7 Ultimate laptop, but it was only a simple Windows Defender update. I've found that on just about every O.S. I use, there are problems with Windows Updates. I run different systems to be able to use older software that's not compatible with the next gen O.S., i.e., XP, Vista, 7, 8.1 and 10. All 32 bit versions. However, one box I use occasionally, a 2009 Dell Vostro running Windows 7 Pro, ALWAYS gave me problems with updates. The kicker... "updates are managed by your System Adminstrator".... which in this case, I guess is Dell, since they built the computer. Drove me crazy until I started to use "Microsoft Update" instead of "Windows Update". Recently, this new 'rollup' download didn't work either on any of my Win 7 systems. IMHO, all this crap started when the Insider Preview of Windows 10 became available in 2015. The normal 10-15 minute wait for updates took hours. Once the "free" Windows 10 update ended in July, things seemed to improve somewhat, but not back to the levels of 2 -3 years ago. On Vista through 10, I use Windows Gadgets in order to watch the CPU and Memory meter; on each desktop or laptop where Windows Update was not working, the CPU meter was pinned at 50%. This was driving me nuts..... on the machines where Update was working, once the updates were installed, then the CPU meter showed a much lower reading. There's something called 'svchost' process that eats up CPU and Memory cycles without mercy. If disabled, you can't get on line properly, so disabling svchost is not the answer. What I HAVE tried on several machines, is to Run MSCONFIG, Services, and disable Windows Updates. Then re-boot, go back to MSCONFIG, enable the updates, and change the update settings to Download Windows Updates Automatically. Once I'm able to get updates, I go back and disable them once again, until I feel like being bothered with this complete nonsense. The only O.S. that seems to perform updates religiously is Windows 10 ( Pro 32 bit ). But even then, on one desktop I set up specifically for Win 10, several times the machine just hung for an hour while applying the O.S. update.
It DOWNLOADED the update, but hung on the install.....three times, to where I just shut it off and forgot about it. NONE of the Microsoft 'fixes' work, including the now-defunct Mr. Fixit, which never fixed anything. None of the registry solutions I read about worked either, although I didn't try ALL of them. None of the suggestions on the Microsoft Support page worked, either. It's a mystery, and basically a hit-or-miss proposition. You should be able to find I.E. 11 somewhere on line, if you can, download and install it, if possible. I'm not familiar with 64 bit systems, so I can't vouch for any suggestions that I've tried on 32 bit. I do know the fresh installs of 32 bit and 64 bit Windows 7 are quite different from each other in how the O.S.'s are configured.

Thanks for the account of your experience with this.
Can you clarify that ? I'm unaware of any "Microsoft Update" as an alternate to "Windows Update" ? Please elaborate. Or did you mean the Windows Catalog, or WSUSoffline, or WUMT . . . or something else ?

Incidentally, for the W7 Pro x64 box I was focusing on, Win Defender updates were still happening (separately), up until around two weeks ago. Now they are just hanging forever, also. Things are seriously effed up in Win Land, if you're asking me.

[Poppa_Meth]

Has anyone noted the bandwidth usage while these problems are happening? The last customer I fixed this for had two laptops displaying these issues. She was on a cellular data plan. Evidently, updates were failing, but Windows kept trying to download a fresh copy over and over again. She ended up getting a bill for using over 900GB on data that month. Needless to say she was not too happy.

[joecass]

Yes, I did apply ONE update after 10-31 on a Win 7 Ultimate laptop, but it was only a simple Windows Defender update. I've found that on just about every O.S. I use, there are problems with Windows Updates. I run different systems to be able to use older software that's not compatible with the next gen O.S., i.e., XP, Vista, 7, 8.1 and 10. All 32 bit versions. However, one box I use occasionally, a 2009 Dell Vostro running Windows 7 Pro, ALWAYS gave me problems with updates. The kicker... "updates are managed by your System Adminstrator".... which in this case, I guess is Dell, since they built the computer. Drove me crazy until I started to use "Microsoft Update" instead of "Windows Update". Recently, this new 'rollup' download didn't work either on any of my Win 7 systems. IMHO, all this crap started when the Insider Preview of Windows 10 became available in 2015. The normal 10-15 minute wait for updates took hours. Once the "free" Windows 10 update ended in July, things seemed to improve somewhat, but not back to the levels of 2 -3 years ago. On Vista through 10, I use Windows Gadgets in order to watch the CPU and Memory meter; on each desktop or laptop where Windows Update was not working, the CPU meter was pinned at 50%. This was driving me nuts..... on the machines where Update was working, once the updates were installed, then the CPU meter showed a much lower reading. There's something called 'svchost' process that eats up CPU and Memory cycles without mercy. If disabled, you can't get on line properly, so disabling svchost is not the answer. What I HAVE tried on several machines, is to Run MSCONFIG, Services, and disable Windows Updates. Then re-boot, go back to MSCONFIG, enable the updates, and change the update settings to Download Windows Updates Automatically. Once I'm able to get updates, I go back and disable them once again, until I feel like being bothered with this complete nonsense. The only O.S. that seems to perform updates religiously is Windows 10 ( Pro 32 bit ). But even then, on one desktop I set up specifically for Win 10, several times the machine just hung for an hour while applying the O.S. update.
It DOWNLOADED the update, but hung on the install.....three times, to where I just shut it off and forgot about it. NONE of the Microsoft 'fixes' work, including the now-defunct Mr. Fixit, which never fixed anything. None of the registry solutions I read about worked either, although I didn't try ALL of them. None of the suggestions on the Microsoft Support page worked, either. It's a mystery, and basically a hit-or-miss proposition. You should be able to find I.E. 11 somewhere on line, if you can, download and install it, if possible. I'm not familiar with 64 bit systems, so I can't vouch for any suggestions that I've tried on 32 bit. I do know the fresh installs of 32 bit and 64 bit Windows 7 are quite different from each other in how the O.S.'s are configured.

Thanks for the account of your experience with this.
Can you clarify that ? I'm unaware of any "Microsoft Update" as an alternate to "Windows Update" ? Please elaborate. Or did you mean the Windows Catalog, or WSUSoffline, or WUMT . . . or something else ?

Incidentally, for the W7 Pro x64 box I was focusing on, Win Defender updates were still happening (separately), up until around two weeks ago. Now they are just hanging forever, also. Things are seriously effed up in Win Land, if you're asking me.

ummmm.... it's hard to explain; apparently every Windows 7 setup is different. Only on a 2009 Dell Vostro 420 desktop running 32 bit Windows 7 Pro, does this Windows Update screen appear suggesting updates be installed from "Microsoft Update". At the moment, if you Google "Microsoft Update", you're taken to a screen showing "Use Your Start Menu to check for updates".... which we all know by now, DOESN'T WORK. I have no explanation for this, it doesn't seem to be the Windows Catalog, Offline, or anything else, since "Microsoft Update" does not appear on any of my other machines, desktops or laptops, running 32 bit Windows 7 Ultimate. Last week I did a fresh install of Windows 7 Ultimate 32 bit on a desktop; when I used Internet Explorer for the first time, it took me to some type of Microsoft setup screen I've never seen before.... enabling Windows Firewall, Windows Defender, Adobe Reader and numerous other automated programs that I refused to download. Seems like Microsoft wants to be in COMPLETE CONTROL when setting up a fresh Win 7 install. I agree 1000% that Microsoft is effed up, as it has effed up yours, mine and who knows how many other thousands of computers. I believe it's a concerted effort to get everyone on the Windows 10 bandwagon..... we might as well be in Moscow or Communist China.

[Seeker47]

Has anyone noted the bandwidth usage while these problems are happening? The last customer I fixed this for had two laptops displaying these issues. She was on a cellular data plan. Evidently, updates were failing, but Windows kept trying to download a fresh copy over and over again. She ended up getting a bill for using over 900GB on data that month. Needless to say she was not too happy.

Bandwidth won't be a passable excuse here: all the machines I observe are on pretty good cable broadband services for internet. Our updates have been attempted at widely varying hours as well, many of them well off-peak, not just during weekday business hours. Some at home were very likely tried after midnight.

As joecass noted, there may well be a random, YMMV factor at work here also. I'm not at all convinced that any "rules" will necessarily apply across all substantially similar hardware and Win configurations. I have one out-of-the-office, from-home report of a few days ago, that I was not able to observe personally. It involved a Lenovo laptop running W7 Pro x64. Despite having made numerous prior unsuccessful attempts -- and being well aware of the 'repetitive exact same procedure, but expecting different results' "definition of insanity" -- this user again selected a bunch of updates, and they somehow came through this time. No remedial changes were made since all the previous attempts, and it's likely right back to zilch the next time around. These were not just the rollup packages, and W7 Pro should not be exempt from the new rules.

[budz]

for anyone using win7 or 8.1 that is having problems with windows updates after a clean install m$ a couple days ago admitted it and a way to get it working. http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-update/windows-7-update-sol...0-7f5096b36d0c

Yo! Thanks for the information. It did the trick for my parent's ASUS laptop.
Thanks to everyone else that contributed to this thread!
I haven't been on this forum for years but whenever I seek information on computer stuff I always come back here!
Happy Holidays to all of you! 🎄🎄

[Seeker47]

for anyone using win7 or 8.1 that is having problems with windows updates after a clean install m$ a couple days ago admitted it and a way to get it working. http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_7-update/windows-7-update-sol...0-7f5096b36d0c

Coming back to this thread with an update of sorts. Never got an answer to my post #36, but -- after having tried a couple dozen other potential fixes that were floating around on the internet -- I tried the advice for the article link you posted, on a key W7 office system that has had Win Update completely locked up since last Sept. And it worked !! Win Update is now unfrozen on that rig, and performing updates again. So, this is evidently not just for fresh installs. Thanks very much !

That said, and as Joecass noted in post #46, the manifestation of this problem can vary quite a bit on different systems. That may account for all the various proposed "cures" out there. I even have one W7U system at home that I think may never have developed the problem in the first place. Occasional very slow updates, yes -- but no outright freezes or lockups. Go figure (? )

Now, the next thing I would really like to hear is that some Win geeks have figured out how to extract only what they want from the rollups, discarding the rest . . . .

[joecass]

It very well may be that the "rollups" are just a collection of KB updates for the month, and, rather than install them individually, they're issued in a 'package'. This seems to be the trend with Windows 10, with new updates to the O.S. every month. Not something I agree with.... since it usually takes quite a while to download and install. I've been experimenting with Windows 8.1 as far as updates on new installs go. Using the "Run" command to bring up 'msconfig', disabling Windows Update, then rebooting. Afterward, changing the setting to "Let me choose" option, then rebooting again, re-enabling Windows Update in the msconfig dialog box, then checking for updates. This worked for me on an 8.1 desktop that after endless hours of trying, couldn't get 8.1 to update itself. In a way, a feeble attempt to return control of the O.S. to ME, rather than terms dictated by Windows 10.