Windows Update Broke Disk Caching

I am posting this in case someone else is having this problem and it may be of somehelp to them.

Last night I was gaming away without a problem in the world but when I was shutting down I saw the Windows Update notification on my task bar. This morning when I started my computer my D Drive was not visible so I did a restart and then I got an error message from IRST which stated that 'OS did not shut down cleanly' and then said there was an error and could not initialise the cache. After the computer had started I looked at IRST and it said the D Drive was incompatible and caching had been disabled. I pulled the back of and removed and reinstalled the D Drive in case it was a poor connection but that did not help. It was at this stage that I remembered the update.

I first went into Programs and features and removed the latest update. I then did a restart and hit Control – I to enter the Raid Control Panel. I disabled RAID here for both the D Drive and the Cache mSATA and did a normal restart. At this time my D Drive was back. I then installed the Windows Update and shut down. Restarted again and ran IRST to accelerate the D Drive. Shut down and restarted and everything is back to normal.


Did the Windows update cause this to happen… I really don’t know but let me say I have been using the lappie as is, without any problems for several months and the morning after I installed the update it did not work. Coincidence?

 

Hi FrozenSolid,

You my friend are the victim of an unfortunate coincidence. If Windows does not shut down properly (particularly a thorny issue with Windows 8), the data in the cache could be inconsistant with what is on your spinning disk. When this happens (has happened to me on system hard crashes, and when I got a little over zealous and forced my laptop to shut down), the only solution is to go into the RAID BIOS an disable caching, which will allow Windows to function "normally", and then re-enable it using Intel RST from within Windows (sounds like you already did this). If I were to guess, when you installed that last patch, due to the cache, Windows thought it was done faster than it actually was, and the system shutdown before it was complete, causing the issue. If you see this again, just go into the RAID BIOS and disable acceleration (completley safe and only makes your computer slower). That should solve the issue, and once it is back to normal, just re-enable the caching. One of the first things I do now when I am having issues, is to disable the cache, as it just complicates things. I spent a couple of hours last year trying to get into Safe Mode in Windows 8, and finally figured out that the boot files on the cache drive were not updated, and the setting was not "sticking." Disabling the cache fixed it. Good luck!

Rich S.

 

Windows Updates break lots of things. I've got it disabled. Most Windows Updates, including many of the "security" updates are just CYA things for Micro$haft to minimize their liability for vulnerabilities. I've had to do clean OS installs numerous times to fix irreparable damage cause by Windows Updates, especially (and I don't know why) on a machine with AMD video cards.

Runs flawlessly...

​

 

Hi LinkRS, I suspect you are right. Here I was thinking, because of the time zone differences, I was probably one of the first people to see the problem so I thought I would give a heads up to everyone ......... and it seems I was probably the only one

Of course the other possibility is Bill thought I was gaming too much so he decided to take away my D Drive for a while

Mr Fox, you are most likely right but I have a fairly standard configuration and some of the Windows updates are stability updates and I am just to lazy to go through them all to pick out the ones that I want so I thought I'd let them do it semi automatically. My update settings is to 'Download updates but let me choose whether to install them' but there was no choice given here, it just downloaded and installed! Maybe I need to change this to just 'Check for updates and notify me'

edit. I have decided to be a bit more pro-active ad I have set my update permissions to notify me and then I will decide.

 

That's the danger in having it enabled. Micro$lop has a really bad habit of changing the Windows Update settings without permission.