Background Intelligent Transfer Service is missing in XP

I am running Win XP Pro.

My Microsoft Updates had stopped working, and at the same time I found my computer less responsive than usual. I tracked this down to an instance of the process svchost.exe using up 50% of my CPU for no apparent reason. I was able to stop this by turning off Automatic Updates, but as soon as I tried to do a manual update the problem reappeared, and the manual update never finished.

After a lot of online searches, I found a post that mentioned BITS, but I couldn't find it on my system.

This solution worked for me. I did get the Error 2, but did not have to use the third fix mentioned. I did install the IE8 Cumulative update.

After that, Microsoft Updates worked again, and svchost was no longer sucking up CPU time.

I am very happy to have my system back to normal, but does anyone know what would have caused BITS to vanish in the first place? Is there possibly a virus or malware that maliciously removes BITS and then removes all traces of itself?

Hi Gaz,

I don't think it was caused by a virus or malware since it only affects the Windows Update site. it's more likely to be a ill-prepared update which triggered corruption in the qmgr.dll file causing it to disappear from Services.

Here's an example of how something like that can happen:

Free ClamWin virus scanner moves most of Windows into quarantine

At the moment though, nobody know what the cause was.  But no doubt the media is frantically searching for the cause so we'll know soon enough I think.

Hi, again, Xircal

I just tried to do a Windows Update, and the same old problem has reappeared. The update process starts but never finishes. An instance of svchost.exe starts using up 50% of processor power. Stopping the update process by killing Internet Explorer does not stop svchost.exe from chewing up CPU time. The main difference this time is that BITS is still present and started.

I am beginning to think that the reason BITS disappeared last time was that I killed the instance of svchost.exe. I have deliberately not done that this time.

If my suspicions are correct, the problem may not be BITS at all - there may actually be a bug in the update process, and the loss of BITS was just a result of my attempts to resolve the update problem.

As far as I know, nobody has so far found out why BITS has been disappearing. Is this the answer?

Could you please give this some thought, and suggest how to fix the update problem?

I had a problem with KB951847 or Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1 and .NET Framework 3.5 Family Update for .NET versions 2.0 through 3.5 and this worked for me. Now I can finally install it. Thank you

You're welcome Alexandar

I have XP Home Edition which I have just upgraded to SP3.  Windows Update has stopped working.  It has 27 files for me but they all fail to install.  There is no sign of BITS when I run services.msc, in either the Standard or Extended tabs. 

This method did not work for me, things go off track right from the start because when I run  %windir%\System32\rundll32.exe setupapi,InstallHinfSection DefaultInstall 132 %windir%\inf\qmgr.inf it asks me for the original XP SP3 disc.  But my disc is only SP1. 

When I put that in and point the program at it, it copies a couple of files even though the target files being overwritten are newer than the ones on the disc, but then says it cannot copy a file with a name like bitsprix. 

This problem has occupied a ridiculous amount of time.  Can anyone please help?

Hi Marbrien,

Please do the following.

Open the Windows Search tool, copy/paste the following and then click Search: qmgr.dll

Search should show that file in the following locations:

C:\WINDOWS\system32

C:\WINDOWS\ServicePackFiles\i386

C:\WINDOWS\system32\bits

Provided they're all present, do the following to register the service.

Go to Start, Run and copy/paste: regsvr32 qmgr.dll and click OK

Do the same with this file: regsvr32 qmgrprxy.dll

Reboot the system and then copy/paste this command into the Run field:

%windir%\System32\rundll32.exe setupapi,InstallHinfSection DefaultInstall 132 %windir%\inf\qmgr.inf

If you're prompted to insert the Windows installation CD, ignore that and in the dialog box at the bottom, change the path to C:\WINDOWS\ServicePackFiles\i386

Restart the PC again and then go to Services and you should be able to see BITS in the list.

Double click it and then on the General tab, click the Start button to try and start the service manually. This is just a test to ensure that it's working correctly.

If you get Error 2: cannot find the file specified, go to Start, then Run again and copy/paste the following command and then click OK:

Reg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\BITS\Parameters /v ServiceDll /t REG_EXPAND_SZ /d %windir%\System32\qmgr.dll

Reboot again and then try once more to start BITS. It should work properly now, but in the unlikely event that it fails again, run the following command and then hit Enter:

Reg add HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\BackupRestore\FilesNotToBackup

Reboot once more and then do the following.

Go to this link and install the  IE8 cumulative November update:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=41074

Finally, go to the Windows Update site and you should be able to download normally.

I had a problem with KB951847 or Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1 and .NET Framework 3.5 Family Update for .NET versions 2.0 through 3.5 and this worked for me. Now I can finally install it. Thank you