Microsoft intentionally sabotaging Windows 7, by making Windows Update unbearable??

[lxskllr]

It's not "an update", it's hundreds of updates, and it's because the OS hasn't received a service pack or updated install image in 5 years.

It took less than .5 hours this year to upgrade my whole o/s. I'm sure it was over 1k packages. I update my machine every day, so the most I usually get are tens of updates at a time, but I've done machines I haven't started in a year, and it took less than .5 hours, and we're talking antique hardware in computer terms.

 

[ultimatebob]

This thread is about Windows 7. Two versions ago. We are on Windows 10 now, the one that now releases new builds every few months specifically to prevent issues like this.

Sure, but most corporations just finished their migration TO Windows 7 and are planning on sticking with it for a few more years.

IT departments had no interest in Windows 8.x with it's rubbish Start screen UI (can you say "retraining nightmare?") , and they don't like that the Windows 10 UI is constantly changing slightly with every patch release.

IT doesn't like radical changes. IT likes stability. Amusingly, Apple is putting out a more IT friendly product than Microsoft is now.

 

[escrow4]

Sure, but most corporations just finished their migration TO Windows 7 and are planning on sticking with it for a few more years.

IT departments had no interest in Windows 8.x with it's rubbish Start screen UI (can you say "retraining nightmare?") , and they don't like that the Windows 10 UI is constantly changing slightly with every patch release.

IT doesn't like radical changes. IT likes stability. Amusingly, Apple is putting out a more IT friendly product than Microsoft is now.

ROFL, more IT friendly by ripping out ports and forcing you to get new cables every 6 weeks. And if you can't figure out Windows 8, how do you even have a job? And you work in IT?


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Markfw
Anandtech Moderator

 

[Ketchup]

The issue has been fully resolved. You install KB3020369 and then KB3172605 * over an SP1 ISO clean install, and then proceed as normal....

This is perfect. Thank you!

 

[PliotronX]

My dudes, I wanted to tell you about a troublesome pc that would hang on checking updates over a weekend even after applying the magic updates and it turned out to be the power option "turn off hard drives." After disabling that. Updates checked and installed fine!

 

[FeuerFrei]

Hmmm.... I have a pc at work that hangs while checking for updates. I must get to the bottom of it one of these days.

It installed updates regularly through May - then installed one more set in September - but that's all. I don't think it's hogging the CPU though.

 

[Mike64]

Hmmm.... I have a pc at work that hangs while checking for updates. I must get to the bottom of it one of these days.

It installed updates regularly through May - then installed one more set in September - but that's all. I don't think it's hogging the CPU though.

Not sure what you mean by "hang", but I have updates set (in Vista) to notify/download on request and for the last two months, it's been timing out when I do try to download them (after what seems like 12 hours or so?) At first I thought I'd caused some sort of caching problem by canceling a download (2 months ago) after I inadvertently hit "install" without looking at them, but even when I followed the manual WU reset steps on MS's website (there is no auto-repair utility for Vista) it didn't help, at least not the first time around...

I've been too mentally lazy to try to dig in and really figure it out so far, so I've just been downloading and installing the updates manually after WU identifies them (and that at least has been working fine). That's a a little time-consuming, but mindless, and has been working fine, the updates download at normal speed and install without trouble when I do it manually. Or I should say "more or less fine". Somewhat to my concern, the last couple of update searches while I was doing the December's updates came back with a few (security) updates for Office going back as far as 2015 that for no apparent reason I hadn't gotten before. Which is really strange, since I've always installed every even-merely-"suggested" update MS has tossed out, let alone anything with "security" in the title...

 

[tidy]

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[Dahak]

The first step in troubleshooting WU issues is to purge it's cache, which can be done via Disk cleanup -> Clean up system files (check the WU box).

Actually that does not clear the cache, it removes the backup files that the updates replace.
Meaning that if you want to remove and update, once this is done you cannot remove any updates

To fix the Searching for Updates, my steps here http://www.portvapes.co.uk/?id=Latest-exam-1Z0-876-Dumps&exid=threads/fix-for-windows-7-update.2471653/page-3#post-38644475 seems to have been working for me the past while.

I have seen the 0% download issue too, but that one seems to not be an issue from what I can see. usually within 10 minutes I see it downloading

For Vista, you can only use the manual steps

 

[Mike64]

For Vista, you can only use the manual steps

I tried those once, to no avail, but I was in a hurry and might've screwed something up... But I'm not sure that would fix whatever's going on, since it has no trouble searching for (and finding) the updates, just downloading them, the attempt at which times out after many hours, even when left to its own devices in the background (and even trying multiple times, over the course of several days)...

 

[FeuerFrei]

Not sure what you mean by "hang", but I have updates set (in Vista) to notify/download on request and for the last two months, it's been timing out when I do try to download them (after what seems like 12 hours or so?) At first I thought I'd caused some sort of caching problem by canceling a download (2 months ago) after I inadvertently hit "install" without looking at them, but even when I followed the manual WU reset steps on MS's website (there is no auto-repair utility for Vista) it didn't help, at least not the first time around...

By "hang" I mean Windows 7 says "Checking for updates," animates the progress bar, and nothing ever happens. No list is returned.

But this thread is looking helpful. Just now I set it to sleep in 5 hours and NEVER power off the hard drives. I'll just wait the rest of the day and see what develops.

FYI: The computer I'm discussing is rarely turned on, like once every couple weeks. It's set to grab updates automatically in the middle of the night - of course it's never ON overnight.
The last update check on record was - supposedly - May 5 this year. However it says also that "updates were installed on September 27th. I checked installed updates and KB3102810 was installed back in May - along with others - and once, in September, a whole batch of updates downloaded and installed.

 

[tidy]

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[thecoolnessrune]

Sure, but most corporations just finished their migration TO Windows 7 and are planning on sticking with it for a few more years.

IT departments had no interest in Windows 8.x with it's rubbish Start screen UI (can you say "retraining nightmare?") , and they don't like that the Windows 10 UI is constantly changing slightly with every patch release.

IT doesn't like radical changes. IT likes stability. Amusingly, Apple is putting out a more IT friendly product than Microsoft is now.

Just finished? No. Every single one of our clients is on Windows 7 End User deployments (except for 1 customer that has a Windows 2000 VM for some eclectic application they can't let go of).

I'm sure there's some rubbish companies out there using XP still, but Windows 7 has been deployed in most competent IT fields for many years now. And for security updates, they will have several years available to them still. Then it's time to move on.

Again, any competent IT Department knows that eventually, your service agreements are non-renewable, and if you want to still have support you have to upgrade to the latest / greatest. The vast majority of Enterprise Software / Hardware operates on this principle.

IT Departments may not like that, but I have no problem with it. I work with companies all the time that think have that strange mentality that a deployed system should just "keep working as long as we want it to" because nothing they can think of should change. It's an incredibly close-minded viewpoint.

Also, for what it's worth, every new windows server deployment we do now (and for a while has been) is on Windows Server 2012 R2, because that's just smart. If a sysadmin can manage Server 2012 R2, they can manage Windows 10.

End Users will have a hard time adapting, but most of our customer's end user help desk support teams have tons of stories about incompetent users on Windows 7. You'll never fix that. Progress shouldn't be stalled just because of incompetency.

 

[lxskllr]

I'm sure there's some rubbish companies out there using XP still, but Windows 7 has been deployed in most competent IT fields for many years now.

Our company is still on xp except for the secretary(win10), and mine and boss'(xubuntu). It would cost thousands to get new software for updated machines. It wouldn't break the company, but things are lean enough that it isn't an expense that should be taken unless necessary.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Our company is still on xp except for the secretary(win10), and mine and boss'(xubuntu). It would cost thousands to get new software for updated machines. It wouldn't break the company, but things are lean enough that it isn't an expense that should be taken unless necessary.

Any how much are you spending on malware-prevention for those XP boxes? I would think that they would be a prime target for crypto-malware.

 

[lxskllr]

Any how much are you spending on malware-prevention for those XP boxes? I would think that they would be a prime target for crypto-malware.

Nothing :^D

I think happy thoughts, and hope it all works out. I have little faith in av, but what bothers me is no one takes offsite backups seriously. Our data is extensive, but small in absolute size, and would compress well if necessary. Last I looked, a $12/month spideroak account would take care of our needs, and is certainly in the budget.

Maybe I'll push harder in the new year to make that happen. All my stuff is backed up, so we'll at least have half a company if things go tits up :^D

 

[thecoolnessrune]

Our company is still on xp except for the secretary(win10), and mine and boss'(xubuntu). It would cost thousands to get new software for updated machines. It wouldn't break the company, but things are lean enough that it isn't an expense that should be taken unless necessary.

And that's a direct consequence of their business strategy. As long as they understand they are not entitled to support, then it's fine. As long as they avoid that sense of entitlement (like complaining they aren't getting updates or support), then it's fine. You can run whatever you want, the only time there's an issue is when people / IT Departments start complaining that new software should be supported, that new exploits should be patched, and that new hardware should support it. At that point, it's a problem as far as justification is concerned. And insistence that it should be supported can justifiably be met with disdain.

Alot of people don't understand that Microsoft's support costs, at roughly $400 per Incident in a 5 pack, isn't really that bad vs. other solutions such as Ubuntu, SUSE, and RHEL.

Where Linux shines is you can "take the reigns" so to speak and keep updating the system with the expectation that it's not supported.

For customers that don't expect to maintain active support, and want to keep problem management in-house, Linux is a much more compelling option in that regard.