Problem with Windows Update (it won't work)

[asheenlevrai]

Hi

 

I experience issues with WU on a Win10 pro x64 PC running 2004.

The last updates were done 10 days ago (Sept 5th), mostly Ms Office stuff and a few others. Win10 was updated to 2004 on Aug 28th.

Now when I try to update manually I get the following error message:

 

"We couldn't connect to the update service. We'll try again later, or you can check now. If it still doesn't work, make sure you're connected to the Internet."

 

I made sure I'm connected to the internet. I also have plenty of disk space (142GB available).

Except from WU, everything seems to work well.

 

I tried googling this issue and found some advice but nothing seems to solve my problem.

 

Any advice/idea?

Thank you very much in advance for your help.

 

best,

-a-

[asheenlevrai]

15 hours ago, AndrzejL said:

Download this:

 

https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=691209

 

Fire it up and go through the prompts choosing to "Update this machine".

 

See if that helps.

 

Cheers.

 

Andrzej

Thank you

 

I ran the update assistant but unfortunately the symptoms are no different.

 

Any other suggestion?

Thanks again

-a-

[asheenlevrai]

13 hours ago, AndrzejL said:

Hey Bud,

 

Sorry for the wait - was at work. I thought about it and here are few things you could check.

 

No problem. Of course! You're actually super fast at replying. I appreciate it :)

 

13 hours ago, AndrzejL said:

Check your internet connection:

 

- is ipv6 enabled? Sometimes disabling ipv6 helps.

I'll check that

 

13 hours ago, AndrzejL said:

- set up static DNS 8.8.8.8 and 1.1.1.1

 

Already tried that

13 hours ago, AndrzejL said:

- using a vpn or something like it (proxy)?

nope

13 hours ago, AndrzejL said:

Disk space?

plenty (146GB)

13 hours ago, AndrzejL said:

 

Run cmd as administrator and in it run

 

chkdsk c: /F

 

When asked if you want to scan disk during next boot choose Y and press enter. Then reboot and let it check the drive.

I'll do that ASAP

 

13 hours ago, AndrzejL said:

 

Run cmd as administrator and in it run

 

Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth && Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth && DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth && SFC /Scannow && shutdown -r -t 1

This will check system for errors and restart your computer after.

 

A'll try that too

13 hours ago, AndrzejL said:

 

Temporarily disable the antivirus protection

 

I only have Win's built-in AV

13 hours ago, AndrzejL said:

 

 

Try updating again.

 

So far that's what I came up with. Lets see if that fixes it.

 

Cheers.

 

Andrzej

 

 

Thank you very much for all that. I really appreciate :)

I'll come back reporting ASAP.

 

Best,

-a-

[asheenlevrai]

On 9/16/2020 at 7:55 PM, AndrzejL said:

 

- is ipv6 enabled? Sometimes disabling ipv6 helps.

 

I disabled IPV6, rebooted -> WU still won't work

 

On 9/16/2020 at 7:55 PM, AndrzejL said:

Run cmd as administrator and in it run

 

chkdsk c: /F

 

When asked if you want to scan disk during next boot choose Y and press enter. Then reboot and let it check the drive.

 

I did that remotely, thus I couldn't monitor what was going on while CheckDisk was running. Is there a log file stored anywhere?

Anyways. it didn't take long for the login screen to appear again, so I believe checkdisk didn't have much to do.

 

 

On 9/16/2020 at 7:55 PM, AndrzejL said:

Run cmd as administrator and in it run

 

Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /CheckHealth && Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /ScanHealth && DISM /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth && SFC /Scannow && shutdown -r -t 1

This will check system for errors and restart your computer after.

 

I did that and no errors/corruption were found

 

On 9/16/2020 at 7:55 PM, AndrzejL said:

 

 

Wow! I just realized you made this clip to guide me. You. Are. Amazing.

 

 

 

On 9/16/2020 at 7:55 PM, AndrzejL said:

Try updating again.

the symptoms are still the same.

I'm running the windows update using the media creation tool once again. We'll see

On 9/16/2020 at 7:55 PM, AndrzejL said:

 

Thank you so much!

 

Best,

-a-

[asheenlevrai]

5 minutes ago, AndrzejL said:

 

Hahaha  thanks!

 

 

Run adwcleaner https://downloads.malwarebytes.com/file/adwcleaner - but if you do it remotely you will be cut off (all the apps are being closed) and you won't be able to remotely control the PC / reboot wiithout physical access to the PC so maybe run in administrator cmd:

 

shutdown -r -t 300

 

So that it reboots after 5 minutes anyway?

 

I mean.. Your problem is internet connectivity related... Maybe a router is misconfigured? Maybe there's a network issue? DNS issue should solve itself by disabling IPV6 and enabling static DNS servers...

 

Try going thru the Settings > Updates and Security > Troubleshoot?

 

or download troubleshooter from here:

 

http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9830262

 

Try running

 

net stop wuauserv

 

from administrator's cmd and then re-running updates?

 

Try running

 

net start wuauserv

 

from administrator's cmd and then re-running updates?

 

Try resetting Windows Updates?

 

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-update/hard-reset-windows-updates/2e26953d-58c4-4704-b627-4a743e87e15c?tm=1447931905306

 

Let's see if any of this works... I am out of ideas... This time no video  

 

Thanks A LOT

I'll look into all of that and report if anything works (upgrading/updating via MCT2004.exe didn't solve the problem).

 

5 minutes ago, AndrzejL said:

 

Is reinstall an option?

Yeah. I usually call that planB

On most desktops I would do that rather quickly, to avoid the hassle of troubleshooting.

On this machine, though... There are several apps that would require a lot of reconfiguration and for some of them, I may not have the install files available. I'll need to look into that carefully. But that's definitely an option I guess.

 

I know I say it a lot but I mean it. Thank you

 

5 minutes ago, AndrzejL said:

 

 

No problem.

 

Andrzej

 

[Donut417]

On 9/15/2020 at 4:42 PM, asheenlevrai said:

unning 2004.

Did it automatically install 2004 or did you force it? I only ask because 2004 has been a dumpster fire of an update. I dont think they are actually pushing it to all machines yet, because they were having issues. 

[asheenlevrai]

1 minute ago, Donut417 said:

Did it automatically install 2004 or did you force it? I only ask because 2004 has been a dumpster fire of an update. I dont think they are actually pushing it to all machines yet, because they were having issues. 

2004 was an option on WU on this machine for a while.

I ended up selecting the update on Aug 28th after I did so on a dozen similar PCs without any problem.

The upgrade went smoothly and WU was working normally until Sept 5th apparently (last updates in WU history).

 

I didn't "force" the upgrade to 2004 via Windows upgrade assistant until Sept 16th (see post #3). However, since this rig was already running 2004, idk what was actually done by WUA.

[Donut417]

2 minutes ago, asheenlevrai said:

2004 was an option on WU on this machine for a while.

I ended up selecting the update on Aug 28th after I did so on a dozen similar PCs without any problem.

The upgrade went smoothly and WU was working normally until Sept 5th apparently (last updates in WU history).

 

I didn't "force" the upgrade to 2004 via Windows upgrade assistant until Sept 16th (see post #3). However, since this rig was already running 2004, idk what was actually done by WUA.

If it were me, Id just back up and reinstall. Because to me it sounds like something broke badly. On the flip side you could try using the reset function in Windows 10. They have an option to keep your files, but your software will need to be reinstalled. It might however fix what ever was broke. 

[asheenlevrai]

It seems like my problem might be related to Office 2016 (or this is only a side effect).

 

I went to another Win10 2004 PC and looked at the update history.

I wanted to manually install all updates subsequent to Sept 5th. I DLed them from Microsoft Update Catalog.

I started by the last update (KB4576478): .NET Framework -> installed manually

Then I selected the next one (KB4571756): Cumulative ... for Win10 2004 -> WU says it's already present !?!

Then there were a bunch of office updates. The most recent one being related to Word. I tried to DL it but it was a .cab file so I didn't know how to install it.

I launched Word in order to see if there was a way to update from within Word. But as soon as Word launched I got an error message related to the license (?!?).

I grabbed my Office 2016 install iso and launched it -> selected "repair" -> didn't succeed ("an error occured").

I thought, OK something is messed up with Office... So I uninstalled office and tried to make a fresh install of Office 2016 -> didn't succeed ("an error occured").

 

I believe PlanB is getting closer

[Donut417]

7 minutes ago, asheenlevrai said:

It seems like my problem might be related to Office 2016 (or this is only a side effect).

 

I went to another Win10 2004 PC and looked at the update history.

I wanted to manually install all updates subsequent to Sept 5th. I DLed them from Microsoft Update Catalog.

I started by the last update (KB4576478): .NET Framework -> installed manually

Then I selected the next one (KB4571756): Cumulative ... for Win10 2004 -> WU says it's already present !?!

Then there were a bunch of office updates. The most recent one being related to Word. I tried to DL it but it was a .cab file so I didn't know how to install it.

I launched Word in order to see if there was a way to update from within Word. But as soon as Word launched I got an error message related to the license (?!?).

I grabbed my Office 2016 install iso and launched it -> selected "repair" -> didn't succeed ("an error occured").

I thought, OK something is messed up with Office... So I uninstalled office and tried to make a fresh install of Office 2016 -> didn't succeed ("an error occured").

 

I believe PlanB is getting closer

My advice is to turn off auto update entirely when you reinstall. Set your connection to metered. You need to vet these updates before you install them. Or at the very least, install one at a time. If it starts to have issues then you know what update it was. There is another thread on LTT.com with someone who is still running on like 1809, because they had tons of issues with the newer versions of Windows 10. While I'm the first to say you need to stay updated, with Windows 10, you have to be cautious of updates.