January 12th 2016 Security Update Release Summary

[maxseven]

When I launched Windows Update, I immediately got an error message (can't remember the code). Internet research led me to find out that BITS (Background Intelligent Transfer Service) was set to Disabled instead of Manual. Very strange.

My BITS is set to Auto (Delayed) so I'm not sure what you're saying here.

I've had no problems at all updating to the recent batch of security updates, though I have NOT installed KB2952664.

 

[Borg 386]

I've noticed the same long loooong delay in d/l ing updates. Something I have penned down, it seems to only be happening on my 7 64, at least on my end. Win 7 32 has had no problems updating, 8.1 on my Wife's lappy has had no problems. The 7 64 on my PC was hanging at "searching for updates" & I thought this might be a fluke or a problem caused by something I installed until I went & tried to update 7 64 on a lappy & encountered the same problem.

I tried several fixes for the 7 64 on the PC & finally got it to d/l, rather slowly (but at least it started working again), by going to Windows/software distribution/data store & as per MS instructions, cleared the entire folder.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/958046

Updater has been exhibiting some strange behavior for a bit now, such as after running for 45 mins, one moment showing 0% downloaded & the next moment showing 80% downloaded. I'm wondering if this instability in the updater agent is caused on my 7 64 machines because of my refusal to allow any patch related to Win 10 or disallowing anything telemetry related on the machine.

 

[Seffrid]

Updater has been exhibiting some strange behavior for a bit now, such as after running for 45 mins, one moment showing 0% downloaded & the next moment showing 80% downloaded. I'm wondering if this instability in the updater agent is caused on my 7 64 machines because of my refusal to allow any patch related to Win 10 or disallowing anything telemetry related on the machine.

That's my experience on both my Windows 7 64 machines, not always but quite often. It sits at 0% for a while so I nip out the room and when I come back a moment later it's starting to install. I agree with your theory in that some of the updates I suspect we both hide are partly related to "enabling MS to improve the upgrade experience" so we don't want them, but they are also related to upgrading the normal update procedure. I'd rather have the intermittently slow updates than install any Windows 10 nagware or send more data to MS.

 

[Brds7t7]

Not sure about everyone else, but I haven't had any issues with slow updates since installing this:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/kb/3102810

I know a lot of people have opted to skip the newer Windows update clients because of Windows 10. But it's worked for me. And testing in newly installed VM's it also works. The scan time for all updates went from hours to around 5-10 minutes.

 

[Borg 386]

That's my experience on both my Windows 7 64 machines, not always but quite often. It sits at 0% for a while so I nip out the room and when I come back a moment later it's starting to install. I agree with your theory in that some of the updates I suspect we both hide are partly related to "enabling MS to improve the upgrade experience" so we don't want them, but they are also related to upgrading the normal update procedure. I'd rather have the intermittently slow updates than install any Windows 10 nagware or send more data to MS.

Well, that last part was just speculation on my part. I've disallowed any telemetry/Win 10 patches on the 7 32 & 8.1, so I would think that those would be effected by that too were that the case. Yet for some odd reason, 7 64 seems to be the OS with all the updater problems for me.

Thanks for the link Brds7t7, I believe I may have tried that, but I'll review my logs & see if I did & if not, give that a shot.

 

[Anak]

Brds,

What is your d/l'd time now compared to before you installed 3102810? I've had 3102810 installed since the November patch on 11/15/15, and this is my experience.

Excerpt is from the: Internet Explorer 8, 9, 10 support ends on January 12, 2016 thread:

My January patches went okay except for the download/install time that seems to take forever, I start the process then walk away and work at something else around the house, come back in a half an hour and I'm ready for a restart. Any other 101MB download site would only take me about 2 maybe 3 minutes, not 15 to 20 through WU.
Yes, I do understand the millions of machines banging on the update servers at one time, but there's gotta be a better way.

I guess I shouldn't complain though, a half hour isn't as bad a time as some I've heard.

 

[Seffrid]

One other theory I had about the recent change in download times was that MS have reduced the download server support for Windows 7 patches by switching some of the server hardware to Windows 10 downloads. For me the actual downloading is fine, as is the prompting that there are updates when I switch the computers on, it's simply beginning the downloading that seems to take longer these days. It sits on 0% for a while, after that it's pretty quick.

 

[Brds7t7]

Hey Anak, well I've noticed that it does vary depending on the time of day I check for updates. Morning always seems to be a lot faster for me than at night. I'm in England though so it could be different over on your side of the world.
In my VM tests without the update installed I've gone from as little as 2 hours to as much as 8+ hours.
After installing that update the maximum I've waited is around 20 minutes for it to pick up all the updates. Usually though it's around 5-10 minutes to pick them all up.

 

[Borg 386]

One other theory I had about the recent change in download times was that MS have reduced the download server support for Windows 7 patches by switching some of the server hardware to Windows 10 downloads. For me the actual downloading is fine, as is the prompting that there are updates when I switch the computers on, it's simply beginning the downloading that seems to take longer these days. It sits on 0% for a while, after that it's pretty quick.

That's actually a very good theory because I know that this debacle with the updater being slow started right around the time of Win 10 release & went on from there. About 2 weeks into it, some of the 10 users were stating that updating was taking forever. Haven't seen any complaints about 10 updates being slow, but I have seen plenty from 7 users. So that might just be the case.

 

[Anak]

Thanks Brds!

Borg, I've also heard of the server shifting as described by Seffrid.

 

[Borg 386]

Thanks Brds!

Borg, I've also heard of the server shifting as described by Seffrid.

So, anyone not using 10 got put on the back burner:sarc:

While running a fix it for the updater, I came across some MS mixed messages.

The first pic was the message I got after the updater agent fix it ran. The second was what I saw when I scrolled on down the log. Soo....does that mean it THINKS it fixed it?

(No, it didn't fix it BTW)

 

[Callender]

Updater has been exhibiting some strange behavior for a bit now, such as after running for 45 mins, one moment showing 0% downloaded & the next moment showing 80% downloaded. I'm wondering if this instability in the updater agent is caused on my 7 64 machines because of my refusal to allow any patch related to Win 10 or disallowing anything telemetry related on the machine.

I had been experiencing Windows Update problems for at least a year and have attempted numerous fixes.

Symptoms have included:

Windows could not check for updates
High RAM usage by svchost.exe (netsvcs) when daily update check runs) with datastore.edb read/ write issues.
BITS service not starting when called.

Not all symptoms occurred at the same time.

Anyway I fixed problems many times and everything seemed okay but eventually there would be another problem.

I do not have any Windows 10 upgrade or any telemetry updates installed and currently Windows Updates works just fine.

The problem with running automated fixes - MS Fixit or batch files to reset WU

Some services may need to be stopped before running fixes. Some fixes work better without an internet connection. Some automated fixes are supposed to delete certain directories and file but do not always succeed and manual confirmation of deletion is required. Even resorting to force deleting problem files may be necessary.

It may be necessary to force install a particular version of Windows Update Agent / Client.

There is an MS Fixit that is supposed to completely remove then reinstall Windows Update Agent/ Client but even then it does not work exactly as intended.

After running fixes I have found it better to keep Windows Update service disabled for 24 hours (until well after the next automatically scheduled update check) before enabling Windows Update service then immediately rebooting and then running an update check.

EDIT:

Forgot to mention that after fixing - Windows Updates has been working just fine for me for the last few months with no issues at all.

 

[Borg 386]

I had been experiencing Windows Update problems for at least a year and have attempted numerous fixes.

Some services may need to be stopped before running fixes. Some fixes work better without an internet connection. Some automated fixes are supposed to delete certain directories and file but do not always succeed and manual confirmation of deletion is required. Even resorting to force deleting problem files may be necessary.

All my updater issues started around the release of 10. All my Win versions were slow for about a month, but then 7 32 & 8.1 straightened out. 7 64 for some reason stayed problematic & got worse.

I noticed that various fixes involved certain steps. My Wife was happy because she said it was keeping me busy . The step that worked was the one I tried in post 22. Today wasn't so bad, 64 took 20 mins to d/l the updates. Not bad considering last time it ran 2 hrs looking for updates & I shut it off. Win 7 32 took 4 mins to d/l the updates & 8.1 about the same time.

 

[meebers]

Made an image before D/L this morning. Noticed that the "folders" ~BT & ~WS appeared, the software distribution/download had a crap load of files in it. Cleanmgr got rid of them. Hid 2664 again.

 

[jelson]

I've noticed the same long loooong delay in d/l ing updates. Something I have penned down, it seems to only be happening on my 7 64, at least on my end.
....
I'm wondering if this instability in the updater agent is caused on my 7 64 machines because of my refusal to allow any patch related to Win 10 or disallowing anything telemetry related on the machine.

I too have hidden all the W10 and telemetry updates on my W7 64 machine. And back in the summer, I had similar experiences of slowness and instability after I had installed 2 Windows Update Client updates: KB2990214 in June and KB3075851 in Aug.

After uninstalling both of them, Windows Update behaved normally again. Since then, I've made sure all the WUC updates released since April remain hidden.