5

I've been having trouble with the time on my Windows 10 PC. I've googled several different solutions. The first one I tried said to do a

w32tm /unregister
w32tm /register

When I did the second command, it said something like "Service has been marked for deletion".

Now if I do anything involving w32tm or W32Time, I get some variant of "The specified service does not exist as an installed service".

How do I re-install the time service without re-installing Windows?

5
  • Do you have an application running that locks the Service Manager? Stuff like Process Explorer.
    – Daniel B
    Aug 2, 2017 at 11:30
  • Have you tried rebooting then running those commands again? Aug 2, 2017 at 12:12
  • Daniel B - I am not running any thing that locks the service manager that I know of (definitely not Process Explorer). I did install CrashPlan about a month ago.
    – daveh551
    Aug 2, 2017 at 20:37
  • Twisty - I tried running commands again, but I have not tried rebooting. I'll do that as soon as I finish what I'm doing. Thanks for the suggestion.
    – daveh551
    Aug 2, 2017 at 20:37
  • Twisty - that seems to have done it. I rebooted, re-ran the "w3tm /register" command, and did a "net start w32time". It seems to be running again. Thanks for your help.
    – daveh551
    Aug 3, 2017 at 10:14

3 Answers 3

7

Yes, this service is not found in "Turn Windows features on & off" or any other place. But the command you gave:

w32tm /register

Is the actual way to install it (using a command prompt which was Run as Administrator). Sometimes you need a reboot to put things in order, but I actually just waited a while without rebooting. Here is my sequence of commands showing that it works:

(base) C:\WINDOWS\system32>w32tm /config /update
The following error occurred: The specified service does not exist as an installed service. (0x80070424)

(base) C:\WINDOWS\system32>w32tm /register
W32Time successfully registered.

(base) C:\WINDOWS\system32>w32tm /query /source
The following error occurred: The service has not been started. (0x80070426)

(base) C:\WINDOWS\system32>net start w32time
The Windows Time service is starting.
The Windows Time service was started successfully.

(base) C:\WINDOWS\system32>w32tm /query /source
Local CMOS Clock
1

Follow commands to start w32time and resync windows time: Must be run as administrator

w32tm /unregister
w32tm /register
net start w32time
w32tm /resync
3
  • You can use this batch script for resync the Windows time every start up. Jan 1, 2021 at 20:53
  • The OP clearly stated that they tried the unregister/register commands already and were receiving errors when they did so. The answer already given covers this.
    – Karu
    Jan 1, 2021 at 20:57
  • /resync is not described in the "Tomasz Gandor" answer, which is the only other answer at this point.
    – plasmo
    Mar 31, 2021 at 23:53
0

it is quite likely you have made the same mistake as I did. net start w32tm This will always return this error message because the service name is not the same as the command line utility name.

The service name is w32time. net start w32time

Good old Microsoft, I swear they do it deliberately.

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .