Wondered about Windows update failures? Here are the blunders
Recently, we’ve published a post titled “Windows 11 update destroying SSDs? What you need to know.” That story got some developments: Microsoft did dig into the matter in coordination with Phison, an SSD controller manufacturer whose devices were pointed to most often, and the duo found out that the Windows 11 KB5063878 update could abuse SSDs in various ways, but only if they ran pre-release “engineering preview” firmware. So it’s less of a fault of the OS update than that of the firmware, and Phison, logically, highlighted the fact that regular users were out of danger, since the devices with the controlling code that doesn’t mix well with KB5063878 were shipped to a very limited number of individuals.
While that one made noticeable waves, the “SSD killer update” wasn’t Microsoft’s only failure of this sort. Some affected millions of users and required rather drastic measures to fix. Read on to learn about, arguably, the gravest Windows update-related blunders the company made, and how you can safely paddle through the next one.
Windows 11 KB5062553 July 2025 update
This update refused to install properly in numerous cases, rolled back, and even caused occasional BSODs; when it did install, the systems (predominantly running Windows 11 24H2) started to act up in a variety of ways: the mouse pointer refused to obey, the hardware overheated, and the entire GUI froze intermittently.
The problems were reported by many users, but the cohort that suffered more was the owners of gaming and high-performance PCs. Microsoft responded with patches.
Windows 11 KB5058405 May 2025 patch
On some computers, this update went as far as corrupting or deleting the ACPI.sys driver file, which translated into a critical boot error, the dreaded 0xc0000098 that showed “Your PC/Device needs to be repaired” during startup.
The Windows 11 KB5058405 update flop affected a large number of Windows 11 22H2 and 23H2 users, but enterprise admins had it the worst. To fix things, Microsoft released the emergency out-of-band patch KB5062170; the remedial actions included rolling back to the previous version.
Windows 11 24H2 update installation failures, 2024-2025
This is not a single incident but a negative experience spread through time. Upon its release on October 1, 2024, the Windows 11 24H2 update was seen as a big deal, and the expectations were quite high. You can’t say it landed flat on its face, but as far as the update process goes, the ride wasn’t smooth: users reported installation failures with repeated stalls, update rollbacks and freezing, multiple reboots, and other assorted system functionality disruptions.
The problems were experienced by a significant portion of Windows 11 users. Microsoft fixed things and urged its customers to update manually, through the Microsoft Update Catalog, and only after clearing the update cache in the system.
Windows 10 KB4549951, April 2020
This one was, arguably, the most serious Windows update failure. It triggered critical issues, including BSODs, but those were not the worst kind of problems associated with KB4549951: in some cases, the update went as far as to delete users’ personal files, especially those stored in Pictures and Documents folders. Sometimes, there was no way to recover anything afterwards.
Microsoft advised affected users to uninstall KB4549951, reboot their systems, and even resort to the system restore process if those steps yielded no desired results. The lesson was learned: in subsequent updates, Microsoft eliminated the temporary profile bug, which brought this havoc.
How to protect yourself from Windows update failures?
As you understand, accidents like those described above will happen again. What can you do to safeguard yourself from the fallout? Get the system restore routines in order and adopt a viable backup practice. Here are the posts that cover the basics (and some more advanced stuff):
