Warning, don't turn off your computer during this update!
As often as you've seen this message, you've probably wondered, well, what exactly would
happen if I turned off the computer or, worse yet, lost power during an update?
And what if Windows Update gets stuck and just never completes?
Is it safe to restart the PC, or are you doomed to have something go wrong?
So here's the deal, back when Windows Vista first came out, Microsoft was trying to find
a way to make the update process a little more robust, with more and more people getting
updates delivered over the internet. So they introduced a mechanism called Component-Based Servicing.
CBS, then, no, not that one, does a couple of things differently to ensure that updates
are installed correctly. First, it checks to make sure that all required files are present before starting installation,
and this is perhaps more relevant for what we're discussing today, it marks an update
as complete after it's installed. CBS is part of the underlying architecture of Windows Update, so if there's a power
loss or you just unplug your computer during an update as part of some kind of masochistic
experiment, it'll kick back in once you boot back into Windows and see that an update wasn't
marked as complete. Now, it won't know why the update wasn't completed, but it also doesn't have to.
Instead, CBS just rolls back whatever changes the update or made and restores whatever the
previous state was before you started the install, allowing you to try again later without
damaging anything on your PC. So those please do not turn off your computer messages, don't always mean you're at risk
of an imminent catastrophe if you don't follow the instructions, with a caveat.
CBS obviously requires critical files that help run Windows itself in order for it to
operate. So while CBS might work perfectly if a shutdown occurs while Windows is updating the GUI,
or installing some non-critical feature, you still might be in for a world of trouble
if the power loss happens while core Windows components are being updated.
And unfortunately, you've got no way of knowing when that's happening, because Windows doesn't
tell you. The result can be anything from certain aspects of Windows not functioning correctly, to Windows
refusing to boot at all, instead giving you a blue screen of death, or simply a blank
display when you try to start up the system. Uh-oh.
But if this happens, try not to panic.
Even the most disastrous failed updates shouldn't touch the personal data on the drive.
So if your PC won't boot into Windows, you can use a Windows installation USB drive that
you can easily create on another system and boot into that under troubleshoot.
Then you can use startup repair to fix the damaged Windows files that are giving you
the issue. Then if that doesn't work for some reason, you can always open up command prompt from
that same USB, type notepad.exe to open notepad, then use the open command in notepad to bring
up a file explorer window that will allow you to copy any files you need to another storage
device. Or, this is the much easier way, you can just remove the drive from your computer entirely,
connect it as a secondary drive to a different PC, and copy all your files that way.
But okay, what if you feel like you have to restart during the update process because
Windows update is simply not moving and is stuck at a certain percentage for a very long
time, like even for hours. This can happen for any number of reasons.
But if it's been stuck for an excessive period and it looks like your drive isn't busy anymore,
like the LED's not blinkity blinking, it probably won't hurt anything to restart the
system and take another crack at it. Once it comes up, you can use a troubleshooter that's built into Windows to clear the Windows
update cache, which can often fix problems with Windows update.
Just type troubleshootwindowsupdate into the Windows 10 search bar to find it.
So bottom line then, try not to panic if your update gets interrupted.
Far worse things could happen to your data. Like having Linus handle it.
Apparently this script was not written assuming that I would host it.
But I did, John. I saw that. Thanks for watching guys.
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