This week, some Windows 10 users have been reporting that this month’s Patch Tuesday updates left their systems unable to boot. Microsoft has finally come out to acknowledge this issue, publishing a support article detailing the fixes for PCs impacted by the update (via Neowin.)
The company revealed the root cause of the problem was a publishing issue with the October 10th, 2017 monthly security updates for Windows 10 version 1703, version 1607, and Windows Server 2016. The problems only occurred on WSUS/SCCM managed devices, and home or business users who downloaded updates directly from Windows Update or Windows Update for Business were not impacted.
All issues were corrected and validated on the afternoon of October 10th, but the company did not get into details with the specifics of the problems. Instead, Microsoft is providing the following three scenarios for those who are impacted:
- Scenario 1: WSUS/SCCM Administrators that synced the October 10th update (KB4041676 or KB4041691) before 4pm PDT October 10 may still have these KBs cached.
- Scenario 2: WSUS/SCCM managed devices that downloaded the October 10 KB4041676 or KB4041691 update with publishing issues and have devices in a pending reboot state.
- Scenario 3: WSUS/SCCM managed devices that installed the October 10 KB4041676 or KB4041691 update and are unable to boot and/or may land on a recovery screen.
Those who fall under scenario 1 are urged to re-scan for updates to automatically resolve the publishing issue. Individuals falling under scenario 2, meanwhile, need to run a set of commands from an elevated command prompt to resolve problems. Lastly, those in scenario 3 need to reboot the Windows 10 system into Advanced Options at startup, use System Restore to restore to a point before the update, or run a set of commands in Command Prompt to delete pending updates. Scenarios 2 and 3 involve some lengthy steps, so we invite you to check the full details on the Microsoft Support web page.
