This is something that I fixed a few months ago at work but didn’t get a chance to blog about then. Coz of the gap I might not post much verbosely about it as I usually may.
The situation was that we had a Windows Server 2012 R2 that was stuck on a “Preparing to configure Windows” loop. I didn’t take a screenshot of it but you can find an example of it for Windows 7 here. All the usual troubleshooting steps like automatic repairs and last known good configuration etc didn’t make a dent. The problem began after the server was rebooted following Windows Updates so I focused on that. Here’s what I did to fix the server:
- I rebooted the server and pressed
F8before the Windows logo screen. - This got me to the recovery options screen, where I selected the option to get a command prompt.
- Next I found the drive letter that corresponds to the C: drive of the server. This was through trial and error by typing each drive letter and find the one with the
Windowsfolder.- In my case the drive letter was E: so keep that in mind while viewing the screenshots replace. Replace with the drive letter you find.
- I entered the following command to get a list of all Windows updates, both installed and pending.
- The output was as below.
- I noted the names of the updates that were in a “Staged” state and uninstalled them one by one.
- Then I exited the command prompt. This rebooted the server and it was stuck at the following screen for a while.
- I stayed on this screen for about 15 mins. The server rebooted itself and stayed on the screen again, for about 10 mins. After this it proceeded to the login screen and I could login as usual. :)