
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.

This weekend, I fired up a Windows 10 VM image I hadn't used for a while.
