August 2015 Windows Update for Vista Requires One Hour to Run to Completion

Please see,

Update problem 1

https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/6fb3ec9c-4567-4506-94f8-7a176ef19709/connecting-to-a-new-router-has-seemingly-caused-a-problem-with-scvhostexe-and-windows-update?forum=itprovistasetup

Please see my post from August 12th

Update problem 2

https://community.bt.com/t5/Other-Broadband-Discussions/Strange-HH3-problems-becoming-more-frequent/td-p/1514010/page/2

And this,

Update problem 3

http://forum.sysinternals.com/new-to-sysinternals-need-to-troubleshoot-100cpu_topic31564.html

As of 12 hours ago the problem seems to have been resolved and appears all along to have been an MS server issue.

I must have spent 20 to 30 hours trying to resolve this issue. 

On Monday, August 17th, I changed my settings to automatic updates (no idea why I did this) and it took a very long time, finally locking up my system. I couldn't do anything, so unplugged the cpu. (bad idea).

Then when I tried to reboot, I didn't get past the login, but got a black screen and a message that (WINDOWS CALENDATD HAS STOPPED".

I had an APPCRASH, here's the problem signature. I posted this on the Windows forum and since so few people use Vista now, I haven't gotten any help. I can get on the net using the path at the bottom. Also I have looked in Task Manager and it looks like I lost most of the processes that reside in my computer, although it shows them all in Other User. (although there is no other user) Wonder if I can copy and paste these...?

I really need some help. I only know enough to be dangerous. Everything I have done has only made things worse. For instance I reverted to the default boot and now my drives and usb are not recognized...HELP!!

Problem signature:
  Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
  Application Name: WinCal.exe
  Application Version: 6.0.6002.18005
  Application Timestamp: 49e01e83
  Fault Module Name: ntdll.dll
  Fault Module Version: 6.0.6002.19454
  Fault Module Timestamp: 55ae6e00
  Exception Code: c0000022
  Exception Offset: 00009f55
  OS Version: 6.0.6002.2.2.0.768.3
  Locale ID: 4105
  Additional Information 1: 9d13
  Additional Information 2: 1abee00edb3fc1158f9ad6f44f0f6be8
  Additional Information 3: 9d13
  Additional Information 4: 1abee00edb3fc1158f9ad6f44f0f6be8

Read our privacy statement:
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This sounds like one of those problems you need to be sat in front of unfortunately.

Unplugging the CPU (you mean you removed it from its socket ?) could have caused any number of issues. Faced with this I would need to prove the PC good by doing a quick and dirty clean install of either Vista/W7/W8.1 to confirm all hardware is OK.

If it is OK then restore back to a good disk image... please tell me you have full system images... they are a life saver for disasters like this.

Good luck, I hope you find a solution... Vista still rocks :)    

Just reporting that I saw no change when I tried to install this month's September 2015 Patch Tuesday updates for Vista. I ran a manual Windows Update on 10-Sep-2015 and got stuck at Checking for updates... for 40 min before WU reported that 1 recommended and 14 important updates were available for download. The entire update process, including downloads and installs, took just over one hour.

Here's what the CPU consumption looked like for my 10-Sep-2015 Windows Update, with:

• "Checking for updates..." running for 40 min between the 73 and 33 min marks (with svchost.exe saturating one of my cores and constantly consuming 50% of CPU between 60 and 33 min marks)
• Downloads, installs and monthly Malicious Software Removal scan between 33 and 13 min marks
• Re-boot to finish installation (dark grey band) at 8 min mark

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32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox 40.0.3 * IE9 * NIS 2014 v. 21.7.0.11
HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS

I encountered the 40 minutes  or so 'checking for updates' time but this time around there was no problem with the processor locked up at 100% like there was before.

Vista is still a supported OS, and the fact MS seem to be 'penalising' users in this way really annoys me.    

I have also encountered this problem every Patch Tuesday beginning August 2015 and including January 2016. My hunch is that Windows Update is scanning Vista SP2 systems in connection with the Windows 10 upgrade that Vista does not even qualify for. If that is the case, then Microsoft should kindly give Vista an update similar to this one that Windows 7 received in June 2015: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3050265#%2Fen-us%2Fkb%2F3050265

Another possibility is that Microsoft's servers are simply inadequate!

I have been looking around for some ideas/reasons for why I have also been having some odd problems with my Vista unit's updating tool.  And I keep pretty good records, so I am sure I can track down what month this started, when I have that kind of time, BUT that August of last year timestamp strikes me as really close to what my stupid built-in human memory system is 'telling" me.

So I am wondering if there might be some way to actually get facts from either Microsoft, or an outside expert?  I mean, actual information on code written into the updates, or AN update, that has caused this recent weirdness?  That would be NEW code, right?

Anybody get the idea where I am coming from?

Yes, I agree that most of us have better things to do with our time, but there is something about the direction the IT industry as a whole is heading and I am starting to think that maybe we need to start paying closer attention to what this industry is doing.  I better stop at that in my explanation for asking my questions.

So how about that code?  How can we see it?  I suppose if somebody can hand me the code I can check for any odd changes.  I can make some time for that, if somebody outside of Microsoft hasn't already done it.  I write "outside of Microsoft" because there better be at least one employee that knows where the code is stored and can read it, or we're all in heaps of trouble.

Is Microsoft throttling bandwidth for users running Windows Update on Vista machines to give a higher priority to Win 10 users?

I've run multiple Windows Updates since Patch Tuesday on 11-Aug-2015 and couldn't get them to run to completion on my 32-bit Vista machine until 16-Aug-2015.  There were no errors - it just reported that it was checking for updates and never finished, even if I let it run for over an hour.  Process Explorer showed svchost.exe constantly consuming ~50% of my CPU (i.e., complete saturation of one of my Intel Duo cores) and that a thread for the Windows Update service (wuauserv) was responsible for all that CPU activity.

Is anyone from Microsoft looking into this issue where the initial Checking for updates... phase hangs for long periods of time during monthly Patch Tuesday updates for some Vista users?

Mooly01 provided a link to a post <here> by Windows Sysinternals forum administrator MagicAndre1981 stating that that Microsoft released a patch (KB3050265) for the Win 7 Update Client to fix a similar problem on some Win 7 machines. This Windows Update Client for Windows 7: June 2015 at https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3050265 reads in part:

"This update addresses an issue in which system performance can be decreased during scans. This issue has the greatest effect on computers that have a small amount of physical memory."

I've posted additional screenshots in ScousaJay's thread windows update just seems to hang while checking in the VistaForums which show that Checking for updates.... can run for more than an hour on my system during Patch Tuesday updates when Microsoft releases a large batch of updates.  Note that I have no problem running Windows Updates outside of Patch Tuesdays when zero or a small number of updates are found.  That VistaForums thread has over 15,000 views and several Vista users reporting the same issue so this is clearly not an isolated problem.

Here's the CPU consumption for my Feb 2016 Patch Tuesday updates that I ran on Wednesday, Feb 10th.  Checking for updates... was stuck for 80 min before reporting that 13 important updates were available for download.  The entire Windows Update session required 110 min to run from start to finish (the re-boot is displayed as a dark grey band at the far right of the image):

I'd like to know if Microsoft is planning to release a patch for the Windows Update Client for Vista that would address this problem, as they already did for Win 7 computers with limited amounts of RAM.

------------
32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox 44.0.2 * IE9 * NIS 2014 v. 21.7.0.11
HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS

I just wish to stick a note in here that I had the same problem with the March updates as I have had since August of last year and as was so clearly outlined in Mooly01's August 20th post, Update problem 1 link.

I assume that we can conclude after all these many months that the only way we will get any official response from a Microsoft executive is to take the company to court, and I don't presently have the cash for that.  This ain't no glitch thing, for sure.  This is something done because somebody in marketing at the company wrote something into some code and it screwed up our systems.  You folks that are so in love with this company that your love allows you to forgive all manner of corporate mischief will be forgiven by some of us, but the company executives will eventually pay the piper, you can bet your sweet bippy on that.  How that request for payment will be submitted we cannot imagine yet, but it will be submitted in some manner at some point in the future.

And please don't misunderstand, I am not looking forward to that day.  I think this whole business is disgusting and I wish it were not happening, BUT I am also getting sick and tired of the lawless Internet that is allowing all manner of mischief by these companies because our lawmakers are too bloody busy working on matters that belong in the past century and are not looking to the future.  This same exact kind of **** took place when Standard Oil was ruling the roost at the end of the 19th Century and the lawmakers at that time paid no heed to what was being done.

Humans can be pretty disgusting social animals when they are going after that nasty thingy called money.

By the way, I did screen grab after screen grab to document my battle with the March updates.  In fact, I did some of the same documentation in one or two previous battles.

Anyway, somebody is going to get some answers eventually.  That's for sure!