[SOLVED] ONLY Monthly Security Rollup updates fail to install on Windows Server 2008 R2

[xFev3r]

Hi there!

New to the forums but very eager to learn how to troubleshoot Windows Updates failing to install on Windows Server 2008 R2 x64. Currently ONLY the Monthly Security Rollup updates consistently fail to install - you can see the update history here where it frequently fails where other updates succeed:



This problem has been occurring for almost a year now, each monthly "Security Monthly Quality Rollup for Windows Server 2008 R2" fails consistently whereas security updates are applying to .NET successfully.

Currently I have:

Updated the Windows Update Agent, installed servicing stack updates, ran system file scans, checked for S.M.A.R.T. data for issues with the hard drives. Unfortunately this hasn't resolved the issue, the drives appear healthy.

I have followed the SysNative update guide.
1. Run SFC Scan - Windows Resource Protection did not find any integrity violations.
2. SURT/DISM Scan - This completed successfully.
3. SFCFix - this found no corruptions.
4. I have attempted updating after the above, this unfortunately is still failing with the error code: 8000FFFF

I can see a lot of messages in the CBS.log that lists failures and error codes which I suspect will explain what is responsible for the issue. I have attached the CBS.log and SFCFix log files.

I would really appreciate any help with this issue!

 

[Sysnative Windows Update]

Hello and welcome!

FRST Registry Search
1. Click your Start button and type in cmd.
2.After you find the Command Prompt, right click on it and select Run as Administrator.
3. Copy and paste the following into the Command Prompt:

reg load HKLM\COMPONENTS C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\CONFIG\COMPONENTS

4. Please download Farbar Recovery Scan Tool and save it to your Desktop.
Note: You need to run the 64-bit Version so please ensure you download that one.
5. Run FRST64 by Right-Clicking on the file and choosing Run as administrator.
6. Copy and paste KB4462923 into the Search box and click the Search Registry button.
7. When the scan is complete a notepad window will open with the results. Please attach this to your next reply. It is saved on your desktop named SearchReg.txt.

 

[xFev3r]

Hi softwaremaniac!

Please see the attached SearchReg.txt file. Thank you so much for you help on this!

 

[Sysnative Windows Update]

Hi!

Thank you. Please do the following:

Step#1 - FRST Fix
NOTICE: This script was written specifically for this user, for use on that particular machine. Running this on another machine may cause damage to your operating system
1. Please download Farbar Recovery Scan Tool and save it to your Desktop.
Note: You need to run the 64-bit Version so please ensure you download that one.
2. Download the attached fixlist.txt and save it to the Desktop.
Note. It's important that both files, FRST64 and fixlist.txt are in the same location or the fix will not work (in this case...the desktop).
3. Run FRST64 by Right-Clicking on the file and choosing Run as administrator.
4. Press the Fix button just once and wait. If for some reason the tool needs a restart, please make sure you let the system restart normally. After that let the tool complete its run.
5. When finished FRST64 will generate a log on the Desktop (Fixlog.txt). Please attach it to your reply.
6. Reboot and retry updates. If any fail, attach CBS.log.

 

[xFev3r]

Hi softwaremaniac,

Thanks for this! the server is currently in use so I can't run the Farbar Recovery Scan Tool if this may cause the server to restart.

I'll apply this out of hours tonight and report back on the result.

 

[Sysnative Windows Update]

Okay.

Just as an FYI, the issue appears to be caused by an improperly installed updated, which may have happened inadvertently during the install or during the update process when Windows Update tried to mark it as superseded and install the later one.

This fix may be enough to fix it. However, we may need to go through each of the updates affected and clear them out of the registry.

As of right now, I cannot tell you how complex this may or may not be. Let's try this fix and see what happens.

 

[xFev3r]

No worries, I appreciate the explanation as to what may have caused the problem. I have my fingers crossed that this fix will work. Out of curiosity, how do you tell when an update appears improperly installed?

Were you able to determine this by seeing KB4462923 referenced in CBS.log several times, then checking the release date of KB4462923 and then looking at the updates that were attempting installation and figured out that this update shouldn't be attempting to install?

Thanks again, I will keep you posted

 

[Sysnative Windows Update]

No, I simply checked the log and saw where it was reporting an error. When I saw it was referencing KB4462923, I saw that it's causing issues.

 

[xFev3r]

Hi, softwaremaniac!

Apologies on the delay, the fix you provided has resolved the issue with the Windows updates on this server!

As you suspected, the update KB4462923 was in fact the cause of the issue. Thank you so much for your responsiveness throughout our conversation. I would love to give back to this community in anyway I can, I will stay an active member.

Thank you for all the time you have spent on this!

 

[Sysnative Windows Update]

Thank you so much for letting me know! Take care!