That said, Ed recommends taking the extra minute and using Advanced Options. I didn't feel I needed to use Advanced options, so I just hit Next. You'll want to select 'Fix problems with Windows Update.' This will bring up the Windows Update troubleshooter. This will bring up the full Troubleshooting panel. This is the more recent version of the Windows 10 troubleshooting interface.

If your Windows 10 is from a more recent update, you'll see the following screen, which you can also reach by going to Settings > Update & Security > Troubleshooting. I find the easiest way to reach it is simply type 'troubleshoot' in the search box.īecause I'm working on an older revision of Windows 10, the screen above is shown. Microsoft actually ships Windows 10 with a Windows Update troubleshooting tool. Even though it talks about some Windows 7 update issues, the underlying principle is the same. Problem solved.Ī good read on this is Liam Tung's piece, Windows update problems: Microsoft reveals why recent patches broke some PCs. If one is a servicing stack update, it has to install first, and the machine has to restart before it can install the next update. In reviewing this post with Ed, he told me that the most common cause of those 'Update failed' messages is that there are two updates waiting. Restart and try running Windows Update again But if you're able to, rather than going through the effort to update a version of Windows that was originally installed in 2016 or 2017, start with a fresh Windows image that has the October 2018 update already installed. As such, it's often rather time-consuming to start from a fresh Windows image. I often have older VMs pre-configured with a lot of custom tweaks, installed applications, and other elements. Windows 10 tip: Turn on File History for automatic backups.Windows 10 tip: Create a recovery drive.Windows 10 tip: Create a full image backup using this hidden tool.Here are three great articles by our own Windows sensei, Ed Bott, that should help you backup before you go forward. Before you go rummaging around in your system's innards, it's always good to make sure you can recover your data. I know this should go without saying, but I'm going to say it anyway. I'll show you that, then I'll share with you some of the additional steps I would have taken if the update still hadn't worked. Fortunately, in my case, the very first tactic I used succeeded. You can try a bunch of tricks to fix updates when they fail. It made some progress, but then it failed. The template hadn't been updated in a while.Īs is always the case when re-activating a VM, I ran Windows Update. I use a standard Windows 10 starter template VM whenever I need a fresh machine. Because they are essentially just files, virtual machine images tend to sit around, powered off, unless you need them. This weekend, I fired up a Windows 10 VM image I hadn't used for a while.

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