re: Upgrading WSUS Service Pack 1 to Service Pack 2

Robert Neuschul — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 13:02:38 GMT

An interesting but ultimately not particularly helpful article.

It would be useful if the preconditions for installing WSUS SP2 were detailed more thoroughly, with a list of conditions known to cause failures - that is - a more detailed analysis of why the service pack will not install correctly, together with necessary corrective actions..

Case analysis:

On SBS 2008 which was previously [and successfully] running WSUS SP1 this update was "offered" in the SBS console Update tab.

As advised, after first checking all the published preconditions, the administrator ran the update manually. The process proceeded more or less as described, first backing up the existing DB and then uninstalling SP1 and then installing itself until circa 90% completion; at which point the update failed with an "unknown error" and rolled itself back. After a restart WSUS was no longer installed. There was no useful information in either Event logs or in the setup logs to indicate why the update failed.

Manual reinstall of WSUS SP1 from original media, as described in various MS tech notes and KB articles succeeded, but all attempts to reintegrate the service into SBS 2008 console have thus far failed, and nowhere does the SBS Console actually log _why_ it is failing to integrate with WSUS and run its Update functions. SBS Best Practice Analyser gives no indications of any errors or other conditions which might block SBS Console integration.

All GPOs are correct, all WSUS and SQL configurations are correct. This leaves the system administrator unable to fix the issue or to manage client system updates in a sane and sensible fashion.

Microsoft's published advice appears to be that if a reintegration of WSUS into the SBS Console fails then the only remaining option is to reinstall SBS. This is unacceptable.

It is also not acceptable that an installer for a system service of such importance should not first check all conditions and pre-requisites to determine if it _can_ succeed. It is unacceptable that such an installation should fail in a fashion that it leaves the system in an unsupported and vulnerable condition. Given the number of online reports of WSUS upgrade failures in SBS 2008, and the lack of any apparent help from Microsoft, I'd say that this Service Pack isn't fit for purpose.

If you are running SBS 2008 then be warned.