My normal mode of installing updates has always been to have windows notify me and then to go in and manually do this. This has never been a problem previously. I regularly keep windows defender and other updates managed this way on a daily basis. These are often just windows defenders updates.
I openened windows defender and updated. Then I opened windows update to see if there was anything remaining. Instead of coming up 'clean' and saying nothing else was available typical behavior unless a large windows update not working win 8.1 free download of security fixes windows update not working win 8.1 free download thereit just got stuck on checking updates.
I rebooted. Same thing happened, it got stuck on checking updates. I am familiar with windows update getting stuck, so I first ran a full virus check, two separate checks. They both came back clean. Then I ran the troubleshooter. No problems found. I tried a recovery moving back in time about 10 days. The recovery did not fix windows update. Then I worked with sfc and dism until these problems were fixed.
Then I did further searches and ended up running sfc scan and dism. A problem surfaced with these showing 3 corrupted files. All of this work clobbered the data in 'view updates history' but things still showed in 'installed updates.
Update still failed. I rebooted and rebooted, ran and reran sfc and dism and the troubleshooter for what seemed like hours on Wednesday while ordering an external hard drive to prep for the worst. At one point that evening, the troubleshooter seemed to magically 'take'. I thought my problems were solved. All seemed well. I went into windows update to run it even though I was windows update not working win 8.1 free download prompted to do so.
Windows update got stuck on 'checking for updates' again. I backed up all my windows update not working win 8.1 free download and prepared to do a reset of my computer if needed, as it was mentioned as the worst case fix for this problem. This did not fix the problem because it just removed applications and saved my system settings.
It showed information from the prior days efforts since removing my updates history! Update failed again. So I made absolutely certain that I got a complete reset, just out of the box. I went through the entire set up process. The windows defender updates are NOT listed. Any attempt to run windows update is met with failure; it just gets stuck on 'checking for updates'. If I use the troubleshooter it says 'no updates available.
So about now I have no idea what to do next. It won't work, and now windows defender doesn't want to update. Now I have a semi-useful brick that still won't update and is a year out of date and has no applications or data on it In this other community postNetboygold remarked that this is a known issue and pointed to KB Installing and searching for updates is slow and high CPU usage occurs in Windows 8. Every single recommended sfc and dism and refresh and recovery and restore was completely wasted time.
The time I spend now rebuilding my computer from scratch, wasted. All because of a buried KB that apparently one person on the forums knew about. Amazingly it had yet to be marked helpful. I followed the advice, downloaded it, disconnected from the net, ran it, and rebooted.
Ever since then I've been fine. Save for the fact that I have to rebuild a year's worth of computer. This thread is locked. You can follow the question or vote as helpful, but you cannot reply to this thread. Threats include any threat of suicide, violence, or harm to another.
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