How to Restart Windows Update Service in Windows 7?

Question

I'm running into an issue with Windows Update on Windows 7 Professional. I am totally up to date in Windows Updates as of last week, but discovered this issue [today] during my Sunday morning PC maintenance ritual. In CONTROL PANEL -> SYSTEM & SECURITY -> Windows Update, when I select "Check for Updates", I get a pop-up stating:

"Windows Update cannot currently check for updates, because the service is not running. You may need to restart your computer."

I've re-started several times, checked that the service hadn't been disabled at start up, and I've googled extensively on the topic - but have come up with nothing. I know there must be some way to start the service from the cmd line, and I would like to know how to get the service to start at boot.

Please let me know if I have left any details out that may aid in formulating a response. Any of the community's excellent insights would be greatly appreciated!

Answer 1

You can try stopping and restarting Windows Update Service (wuauserv). Open a command line window (run as administrator) and enter the following lines:

net stop wuauserv  
regsvr32 %windir%\system32\wups2.dll  
net start wuauserv  

If that does not help, try Microsoft's Fix It service to reset your Windows Update Components: How do I reset Windows Update components?

Answer 2

I have been looking into this problem and I am presented with a question another question for you. have you checked the reg entry? Service Name (registry): wuauserv.

The cmd line to start win update is C:\Windows\system32\svchost.exe -k netsvcs

Your file may be infected or corrupted if this is the case you will need this utility

SvchostAnalyzer.zip

http://tinyurl.com/3a7pc6u

for more info on win update goto

ttp://wiki.blackviper.com/wiki/Windows_Update (add the H, I could only do one hyper Link)