Giveaway of the Day Forums

1. 

   Controlled Chaos
   Member

   Hi guys and girls,

   I have just bought a laptop for my granddaughter to use for her studies and it has Win 8.1 installed but no updates since about April 2014. I have been trying to get the updates for a few days but have always had a fail with nothing arriving.

   Now after trying various methods from the web it now seems to be doing something. ATM I have about 28 empty folders in C:\windows\softwaredistribution\downloads\ all are empty so far. Does this mean that the update makes these folders and then when the downloads start the files will go into the relevant folder prior to the install?

   If not I might have to see if I can return the laptop to get a refund or exchange. As a matter of interest I did manage to manually install a couple of items when trying to make the 'fixes' and although it did have a free upgrade to Win10 that is not available because it has expired when I bought it a few days ago.

   Posted 7 years ago #
2. 

   Dragonlair
   Member

   I have win 8.1 on a laptop purchased shortly before Win10 came out. I have found that it does not like to have a manual check for updates. It often just seems to stall and do nothing. However, leaving it up for a while and then shutting it down will quite often make it say there are so many updates and place go to Windows Update when you next power it up.

   Make sure the "sleep" is set to never for the CPU when plugged in and then plug it in and let it look/update while you do something else. It may take a long time but it should work.

   Note -- I refused to update to 10. I carefully blocked all the GWX stuff along the way and manually removed a lot of garbage. Then I let it run the "cleanup" after Win 10 was no longer free.

   Posted 7 years ago #
3. 

   ChrisS
   Administrator

   If you can return the laptop then I'd suggest you do that and get a Windows 10 version. There's also a fair chance that the seller will just update it to Windows 10 for you if you complain. It was supposed to have a free upgrade, right? Microsoft wants you on Windows 10 and the seller has copies of Windows 10 that they can easily install.

   It looks to me like Microsoft intentionally broke Windows Update for Windows 7 and 8.1 to force everybody to move to Windows 10. I'm on Windows 7 and the manual update has been problematic since Windows 10 was released. What they seem to have wanted was for everybody to switch to "Automatic Updates" and then get moved along to Windows 10. It's likely to be an ongoing problem for your granddaughter and she's probably going to have enough unknown problems to deal with without having to constantly fight an known issue.

   FWIW, I don't know what fixes you've tried but, supposedly, the "System Update Readiness Tool" is a last resort type fix that might work. It's included as part of Windows 8.1 and more information can be found here: Fix Windows Update errors by using the DISM or System Update Readiness tool. Or, to interpret the KB, the whole point of Windows 8.1 was to move you to Windows 10.

   Posted 7 years ago #
4. 

   johnfranklin1944
   Member

   I Read a PC magazine column about how to get a "Startup new computer- without the bloated software." A special microsoftie tool so that yu can get a real Clean install. It works with win10.

   Posted 7 years ago #
5. 

   JasonP
   Member

   I've had issues with Win10 and had to go back. Once I went back I had issues manually doing updates. But they worked on their own. Agree with Dragonlair. Make sure you updates are set to run and install automatically. And make sure you don't let the computer go to sleep so that this can run in the middle of the night.

   Good luck!

   Posted 7 years ago #
6. 

   Dragonlair
   Member

   JasonP,

   I don't let it do the updates automatically, I just let it LOOK for the updates and tell me. If I do that, it finds them and updates fine.

   I don't seem to have the same issues with Windows 7, just 8.1.

   I just let it look on it's own and then the next time I get on, I let it do it's own thing with them while I do something else. The laptop is not heavily used so I can just plug it in and walk away. The new sewing machine doesn't fit in the old sewing machine table so it works fine as a small computer desk.

   Posted 7 years ago #

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