Microsoft is investigating problems with the August updates for Windows Server 2019, which can paralyze them.
Problematic Windows update.
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Recent updates for Windows Server 2019 released during Microsoft’s August Patchday have led to performance issues. Microsoft is actively working on the issue and providing interim solutions.
IT administrators may notice severe performance degradation on their Windows Server 2019 systems following the installation of August’s security patches. Issues include system sluggishness, non-responsiveness, and high CPU loads associated with cryptographic operations. According to Windows Release Health observations, these problems have been particularly evident in instances where antivirus applications scan the %systemroot%system32catroot2 directory, which houses update catalogs, thus triggering a catalog enumeration error.
Microsoft has clarified that “the issue appears to be confined to certain specific scenarios.” Affected systems may exhibit symptoms such as heightened CPU usage, increased disk latency and usage, overall sluggish performance of the OS and applications, or issues starting the CryptSVC service, leading to black screen on startup, delayed boot, or completely unresponsive systems.
Since these scenarios are usually used in enterprise environments, it is unlikely that home users of Windows Home or Pro will observe this behavior.
Microsoft is initially addressing the problem with the Known Issues rollback mechanism, which can remove faulty updates or update components. For IT managers, the company also provides a special group policy for download in the Windows Release Health notes, which can be found under “Computer Configuration” – “Administrative Templates” – “Windows 10 1809 and Windows Server 2019 KB5041578 240816_21501 Known Issue Rollback” after it has been installed. The GPOs are specialized for different Windows versions and require a restart to become active.
The developers are working on an automatic solution for upcoming Windows updates. It will then no longer be necessary to download and install the group policy. However, Microsoft has not yet announced when the solution will be available.
(dmk)