WSUS SUP causes high CPU and clients fail updates scan

NOTE: The configuration suggestions I mention in this post won’t fix the underlying issue. Depending on the size of your environment they may be enough to get things working for you again. Microsoft is currently working on releasing a hotfix that I have tested and found to resolve this problem

 

Microsoft have released the WSUS server hotfix, details here: https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/configurationmgr/2017/08/18/high-cpuhigh-memory-in-wsus-following-update-tuesdays/

NOTE2: It turns out there is a new issue from the August 2017 updates that “clears” the update history on a computer that will trigger a full client scan again. This will also cause high load on your WSUS server, although for slightly different reasons, however the suggestions here and the coming updates will help to resolve the load issue from that problem as well.

Microsoft have updated the August cumulative updates to resolve this issue, details here: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4039396/windows-10-update-kb4039396

 

NOTE3: Microsoft has now published some additional official guidance here: https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/askcore/2017/08/18/high-cpuhigh-memory-in-wsus-following-update-tuesdays/

This issue is one I first encountered on only a couple of our WSUS servers (2 or 3 of 15 servers) last year in November 2016 after the new cumulative update process was introduced for patching. At first I assumed it to be a failure on my part to do more regular cleanup, or a result of the recent upgrade to ConfigMgr 1610, or an “end of year” rush of activity on the network. This isn’t unusual for the environment I currently manage (Education with approx. 370,000+ devices)

At first I looked at server bottlenecks (we run everything in VMWare) and even SQL DB corruptions. I tried doing WSUS resets, even recreating the database (this is a last resort in a large environment). I then thought maybe it was a Server 2012 WSUS issue as we had other Server 2012 related cases open with Microsoft. To test I rebuilt one server as 2012R2, but the problems persisted. Given it was only happening on a couple of server I assumed it was an issue with those servers in particular and didn’t suspect a larger issue.

Over the Christmas holidays things went quite, so there was nothing more I could do until school returned the following February.

Then everything basically exploded.

The first patch cycle we ran saw the WSUS server rocket to 100% CPU and stay there. Nothing I did could stop this reoccurring. I found ways to bring things under control for a few hours at a time. Endpoint definitions started falling behind because clients couldn’t scan for updates. Then it started happening on a couple more of the servers. At this point I conceded defeat and called in Microsoft. Unfortunately it was another 6 months before they finally identified it was a “function” of WSUS causing the grief and not the configuration or size of our environment.

The Problem

The most obvious symptoms will be clients failing to scan for updates and the WSUS server CPU (w3wp.exe) going very high. Some clients get through, many will fail. The main cause will be Windows 10 clients and the way WSUS has to process the Cumulative Updates.

OneDrive Catastrophic Failure

When trying to open a OneDrive folder on the computer you get a catastrophic failure message. This is related to the “Offline” attribute for that folder being reset, possibly due to some other program or action that had been performed in the past.

The same folder can be opened from Windows Explorer when selecting the folder from the left pane view, but the message appears when opening the folder from the right pane view.

You can check the folder location by right-clicking and selecting “Properties”

Open a CMD prompt, CD to the OneDrive folder location found in the properties and use the ATTRIB command to reset the Offline attribute for the folder

ATTRIB -O "Pictures" /s /d

 

If there are a lot of folders showing this issue, the same command can be run against the whole OneDrive folder instead

ATTRIB -O /s /d

Windows Activation Error Codes

A quick reference for the error codes when you get Activation error in Windows

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/activation-errors-windows-10

 

Windows 10 Speech language missing

 

As part of the Insider program I get rather frequent upgrades to Windows 10. Each time the upgrade installs it resets my speech language to “English (United States)” which means Cortana stops working as my Region is set to “Australia”

I also use ConfigMgr to handle updates on my network (this would also apply for people using WSUS) so when I go into the Region & language settings I don’t get the Speech feature appearing under the “English (Australia)” options.

Luckily, it is relatively easy to sort out.

SOLUTION:

Configuration Manager 1511 adventures

I am starting work on now upgrading have upgraded our ConfigMgr2012 R2 hierarchies to the new “Configuration Manager with no more version numbers” build 1511. There are roughly 120+ site servers in the central hierarchy (across 2 CAS hierarchies), so hopefully things go well. For the most part things went quite well, no major issues at all.

I’ll keep this page to note any special gotchas that are outside the various step-by-step guides already out there, and also some easy quick link references.

Rebuild corrupt Windows 10 App Cache

During the process of numerous upgrades of the OS during the Windows 10 technical preview, I’ve found quite often that my Windows Apps often stop working properly, or display as non functioning icons showing the meaningless name of the app instead of the proper app tile.

Two quick things to try to resolve:

1. From an elevated command prompt run “wsreset”
   1. This will trigger a “Windows Store Reset” and may or may not resolve any initial problem you have opening the Store App
2. From an elevated Powershell prompt, run the following

Get-AppXPackage | Foreach {Add-AppxPackage -DisableDevelopmentMode -Register "$($_.InstallLocation)\AppXManifest.xml"}

This should re-register all the apps that appear in your app cache.

There are still many other potential issues you might encounter such as proxy servers blocking access or corrupt apps, but it’s a relatively easy starting point.

Windows 10 Start menu not opening

This has happened to me a couple of times in the various Technical Preview updates where the start menu stop working.

It turns out a simple powershell command will rebuild the appcache to resolve

Run this in Powershell as admin

Get-appxpackage -all *shellexperience* -packagetype bundle |% {add-appxpackage -register -disabledevelopmentmode ($_.installlocation + “\appxmetadata\appxbundlemanifest.xml”)}

TeamViewer on Windows 10 says screen cant be captured

When trying to connect to a remote Windows 10 machine using TeamViewer, you get a blank screen with the message “The screen cannot be captured at the moment. This is probably due to fast user switching or a disconnected/minimized Remote Desktop session.”

On the computer you are trying to connect to, you may see the screen appear to flicker constantly

 

Windows 8, 10 and Server 2012 R2 upgrade stops at “Setting up a few things”

I’ve done upgrades on several computers and for the most part never had an issue, but everyone now and then I have found that while the Windows install goes all the way through the installation and device setup, it then seems to get stuck during the very last “Setting up a few more things” stage, sometimes stopping at a frustrating 79%!

I’ve tried leaving them for several hours but it never gets past that point. A hard reset is the only option, after which Windows restores the previous version. So at least nothing is lost other than time.

In all cases though, I’ve found the problem is having the Hyper-V role installed. There must be something about the Hypervisor that causes a problem.

After the OS rolls back, go into roles and features and remove the Hyper-V role, then try the upgrade again. After it completes just add the Hyper-V role back in again and it should pick up all the previous settings.

Windows 10 Adventures – Build 9860

Continued from the first post

The first big update has come… and wow. Build 9860 has been made available.

I have already mentioned how much faster and more responsive Windows 10 seems to be, and this new updates seems to kick it up another notch! I’m sure the SSD makes a huge difference, but whatever Microsoft have done with the caching technology is amazing.

• The issue with dragging windows to the top of the screen seems to be fixed in this release
• I’m starting to like the new start menu. I can see now how you can mix and match between menu list items and tile items
• The multi-desktops thing just didn’t work for me in the first build, but they’ve done some nice tweaks and I really quite like it now. There are still a few useability issues, like how to move apps between desktops, but I think this is going to be a lot more useful than I expected

Microsoft is now also giving you a choice to how quickly you get new versions of the preview updates. If you are adventurous you cna take the “Fast” path, or if you want others to find the bugs first you can take the “Slow” path. It’s a little thing, but a nice thouch.

Did I mention it was fast?