Windows updates

Windows update problems

Windows updates can fail for a huge number of reasons.

The first thing to do is to try to manually install each update one at a time. Go through all of them and if they don’t all go through, repeat the procedure till all f them go through.

Failing that, from the Admin command prompt run these commands. Copy and paste each in turn into the Command window.

1 – sfc /scan now
2 – DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Scanhealth
3 – DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth
4 – net stop wuauserv
5 – net stop bits
6 – net stop appidsvc
7 – net stop cryptsvc
8 – Ren %systemroot%\SoftwareDistribution SoftwareDistribution.old
9 – Ren %systemroot%\System32\catroot2 catroot2.old
10 – net start wuauserv
11 – net start bits
12 – net start appidsvc
13 – net start cryptsvc

Restart the computer and run the windows update again.

If this fails, run a complete cleanup of your computer with programs like CCleaner, JRT, Adaware cleaner etc. Restart and try again.

Run the Windows Update Troubleshooter

Windows comes with a built-in troubleshooting application to fix update issues. You can run the Windows update troubleshooter by following the below steps.

1 – Open the Settings menu
2 – Choose Troubleshoot under the System tab
3 – Click on Other troubleshooters
4 – Click on Run next to Windows Update
5 – The update troubleshooter will pop up and look for any available issues.

Final solution

If the above doesn’t work, the PC may need to be restored to an earlier time or the OS would need to be completely re-installed.

At this point, it is most likely that a piece of software or hardware is stopping a successful windows update so a bare metal system reinstallation may be the only way.