Security Update KB5034441 for Windows 10 Ver. 22H2 will not install.

But why don't microsoft withdraw the failing update??? I know, they can do that - I have seen it when they sends a failing Windows-upgrade.

Yes - it downloaded the update - but of course it didn't install the BEEEP

(And yes - I was just making fun...)

Hi Judy,

The problem is unless you've been through at least some of the steps outlined in KB5028997 you may not know whether or not you have a WinRE partition. You may have one that is too small to implement this update. If you then proceed under the assumption you don't have a WinRE partition what is the result of ignoring this update?

I know that the steps outlined in KB5028997 are not necessarily the steps everyone feels comfortable in taking, but I can tell you it works 100% of the time. Out of the systems I have running Windows 10; 3 physical systems and 4 WMWare workstations,

I had 3 where the changes that KB5028997 did not be performed and 4 that did. Three of these were out of the 4 VMWare workstation Windows 10 systems; so, these steps work even in a virtual environment. So long as the entire virtual machine's allocated virtual boot drive has enough space free to make the change you can perform the steps in KB5028997 without changing the VM; otherwise, it would be necessary to expand the VM boot drive space first.

I'm not a Powershell expert so I've done all the steps for KB5028997 "manually" at an elevated command prompt (not in Powershell at all) and successfully completed them, verifying each command entered before pressing <Enter> and possibly making any kind of error. As I say, I managed successfully to complete the steps on four systems. After which I re-ran Windows Update and the update installed successfully and quickly (the file download was basically done from the previously failed installation).

Last, I do, as I've mentioned before, think it is incumbent on Microsoft to deal with a WinRE partition that needs to be expanded. They need to add to the update a precursor step that verifies the necessary space. If the space needed does not exist the update needs to give the end user these options:

1. If there is currently insufficient space, but the free space is available, allow the user to select to automatically apply the changes that are in KB5028997, expanding the WinRE partition sufficiently to install the update while preserving existing data,,
2. Skip the update with information on what doing so really means (in plain English),
3. Offer the option to manually expand the WinRE partition providing a link to KB5028997 and then indicate that upon completion of these steps they can re-run Windows Update to have the update successfully applied. [This would be for people that have confidence in performing the steps and understand the options available with the commands used. a.k.a. "expert level" knowledge.]

These options, in the case of many updates that can cause this kind of grief would be, I think very useful to have at the end user's disposal. Of course, also being able to contact a person in support--something next to no company does any more for non-corporate clients--to assist with update issues would be useful, with the actual result of the assistance being easy to find later for others to see/use. But, that's a pipe dream...

Thanks for the update Judy.

Good Morning everyone! I work for a small local MSP and we had multiple devices with this issue as well and I do believe I have found a solution. So far, the only correlation between the devices I have found is that they can't be upgraded to Windows 11. Whether this has any bearing on the issue, I have no idea, it's just something I noticed. Anyway, the solution I have found is this:

Download and install the Windows Media Creation Tool for windows 10. Here is the link to that tool. https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

Click on the Create Windows 10 installation media Download Now button.

Once you have it on your device you'll run the program and do an "upgrade" which is basically like reinstalling windows 10 while keeping all of your apps and files. Once the "upgrade" has finished I was able to run all needed updates including the above mentioned security patch. There have been a few cases so far where it said it "failed" but, once I did a "retry" it worked for me without an issue.

I did see that there is a way a few have posted with cmd line which I do believe works, however I thought this would be good for a standard user to do who might not be as savy with tech.

If this helps you at all please let me know! So far it has worked flawlessly for me and I really hope that it helps you all out!

Have a great day!