Windows (and Microsoft) Update taking forever "looking"

Hi,

My computer has developed a problem with Windows Update (and Microsoft
Update), which has been described by several people on here that I can find.
The page about searching for updates (on either express or custom, but I
prefer custom) has the green scroll bar thing as normal, and it continues to
move as normal. The trouble is that it doesn't stop searching until it times
out (says something about page not being found, but it's not a 404 error
page). I know it's not a problem with the site itself because I've just
updated another computer (which I just put Microsoft Update on and it
worked)- it's only happened since I had Microsoft Update (but didn't happen
straight away). I've now got rid of Microsoft Update after reading a
suggestion on this website. I didn't restart immediately after disabling
Microsoft Update - I tried Windows Update first, but it didn't work, so I
rebooted and it still didn't. Before I removed Microsoft Update I tried 2
other suggestions linked to from here - stopping the service, registering a
few things and then starting it again, then rebooting, but this didn't work,
and deleting the contents of %systemroot%\SoftwareDistribution\Download. I
rebooted after this too but to no avail. I'm sorry if I missed something
obvious. Has anyone got any other suggestions, or should I try the online
support centre? Oh, and another thing. Someone mentioned that they'd had
problems with their windows update link going to microsoft update. I had both
a microsoft update and windows update link (MU has now gone) and they both
eventually took me to microsoft update, which I assume is the intended
behaviour.

Many thanks,

Jonathan Stratford

PS apologies for the very disorganised and confusing post, if anything needs
clarifying let me know, and I will try my best!

"Jonathan Stratford" <> wrote in message
news:666B1510-3270-43F8-9165-...
> Hi,
>
> My computer has developed a problem with Windows Update (and Microsoft
> Update), which has been described by several people on here that I can find.
> The page about searching for updates (on either express or custom, but I
> prefer custom) has the green scroll bar thing as normal, and it continues to
> move as normal. The trouble is that it doesn't stop searching until it times
> out (says something about page not being found, but it's not a 404 error
> page).


Have you looked in your WindowsUpdate.log for details?

If it's 0x80072EE7 for example, since you are using the web interface
to this newsgroup you could search with 0x80072EE7 MVP
or with 0x80072EE7 MSFT to see threads which might be likely
to have some answers.

Hmm... that code demonstrates a deficiency of the web interface search.
You can't order by date.

So, then you could switch to Google Groups which does allow
sorting of results by date. It also allows more complex search expressions:

http://groups-beta.google.com/group/...85345a7f85eb46

(Google Groups search for
(0x80072EE2 OR 80072EE2) (MSFT OR MVP) group:microsoft.*.windowsupdate
- sorted by date to capture current thinking
- first hit
)


ETC.


Please post some details if you need more help.


HTH

Robert Aldwinckle
---


> I know it's not a problem with the site itself because I've just
> updated another computer (which I just put Microsoft Update on and it
> worked)- it's only happened since I had Microsoft Update (but didn't happen
> straight away). I've now got rid of Microsoft Update after reading a
> suggestion on this website. I didn't restart immediately after disabling
> Microsoft Update - I tried Windows Update first, but it didn't work, so I
> rebooted and it still didn't. Before I removed Microsoft Update I tried 2
> other suggestions linked to from here - stopping the service, registering a
> few things and then starting it again, then rebooting, but this didn't work,
> and deleting the contents of %systemroot%\SoftwareDistribution\Download. I
> rebooted after this too but to no avail. I'm sorry if I missed something
> obvious. Has anyone got any other suggestions, or should I try the online
> support centre? Oh, and another thing. Someone mentioned that they'd had
> problems with their windows update link going to microsoft update. I had both
> a microsoft update and windows update link (MU has now gone) and they both
> eventually took me to microsoft update, which I assume is the intended
> behaviour.
>
> Many thanks,
>
> Jonathan Stratford
>
> PS apologies for the very disorganised and confusing post, if anything needs
> clarifying let me know, and I will try my best!

Thanks for your reply. I actually don't know if what you suggest will work,
because I found another response on this site whilst finding this one that
said that I should check my firewall to ensure that svchost.exe is allowed. I
had blocked this a while back when I found a website that checks my
connection and found several ports open, so I blocked the things that seemed
to close the ports. Unblocking svchost has solved the problem

Thanks again,

Jonathan Stratford

"Robert Aldwinckle" wrote:

> "Jonathan Stratford" <> wrote in message
> news:666B1510-3270-43F8-9165-...
> > Hi,
> >
> > My computer has developed a problem with Windows Update (and Microsoft
> > Update), which has been described by several people on here that I can find.
> > The page about searching for updates (on either express or custom, but I
> > prefer custom) has the green scroll bar thing as normal, and it continues to
> > move as normal. The trouble is that it doesn't stop searching until it times
> > out (says something about page not being found, but it's not a 404 error
> > page).
>
>
> Have you looked in your WindowsUpdate.log for details?
>
> If it's 0x80072EE7 for example, since you are using the web interface
> to this newsgroup you could search with 0x80072EE7 MVP
> or with 0x80072EE7 MSFT to see threads which might be likely
> to have some answers.
>
> Hmm... that code demonstrates a deficiency of the web interface search.
> You can't order by date.
>
> So, then you could switch to Google Groups which does allow
> sorting of results by date. It also allows more complex search expressions:
>
> http://groups-beta.google.com/group/...85345a7f85eb46
>
> (Google Groups search for
> (0x80072EE2 OR 80072EE2) (MSFT OR MVP) group:microsoft.*.windowsupdate
> - sorted by date to capture current thinking
> - first hit
> )
>
>
> ETC.
>
>
> Please post some details if you need more help.
>
>
> HTH
>
> Robert Aldwinckle
> ---
>
>
> > I know it's not a problem with the site itself because I've just
> > updated another computer (which I just put Microsoft Update on and it
> > worked)- it's only happened since I had Microsoft Update (but didn't happen
> > straight away). I've now got rid of Microsoft Update after reading a
> > suggestion on this website. I didn't restart immediately after disabling
> > Microsoft Update - I tried Windows Update first, but it didn't work, so I
> > rebooted and it still didn't. Before I removed Microsoft Update I tried 2
> > other suggestions linked to from here - stopping the service, registering a
> > few things and then starting it again, then rebooting, but this didn't work,
> > and deleting the contents of %systemroot%\SoftwareDistribution\Download. I
> > rebooted after this too but to no avail. I'm sorry if I missed something
> > obvious. Has anyone got any other suggestions, or should I try the online
> > support centre? Oh, and another thing. Someone mentioned that they'd had
> > problems with their windows update link going to microsoft update. I had both
> > a microsoft update and windows update link (MU has now gone) and they both
> > eventually took me to microsoft update, which I assume is the intended
> > behaviour.
> >
> > Many thanks,
> >
> > Jonathan Stratford
> >
> > PS apologies for the very disorganised and confusing post, if anything needs
> > clarifying let me know, and I will try my best!
>
>
>