Problems remain after Microsoft yanks Windows RT 8.1 update

In case you missed it, late Friday afternoon Microsoft pulled the Windows RT 8.1 update. Enough customers complained about BSODs and completely bricked machines — including, notably, Microsoft Surface RT machines — after applying the RT-to-RT 8.1 upgrade that the update was yanked entirely.

There’s also been a steady stream of complaints about the Win8-to-Win8.1 update, including an inability to connect with Remote Access Website connections. Here’s an overview of what we know so far has happened, and how you may be able to recover.

Microsoft released the Windows 8.1 upgrade early in the morning (U.S. time) on Oct. 17. For consumers and others who don’t have Volume License agreements with Microsoft, the update was directly accessible through the Microsoft Store. Volume Licensees had access through the VLSC. Of course, MSDN and TechNet members have had access to the Windows 8.1 Enterprise (but not the Windows RT 8.1) bits for a month.

By Oct. 18, many users had reported problems with a Blue Screen, 0xC1900101 – 0x40017 error with the Windows 8.1 update. To date, the Microsoft Answers forum discussion that deals with that specific BSOD is up to 24 pages of comments, and Microsoft hasn’t responded with any worthwhile suggestions, much less a solution.

Now we’re seeing a second wave of problems.

Windows RT customers (those with retail copies of Windows RT, not volume licensees) encountered unresolved Blue Screen 0xc000000d errors with notification that “Your PC needs to be repaired / The Boot Configuration Data file is missing some required information / File: BCD”. On Oct. 19 — two days after the update was released — Microsoft MVP Wesley_P posted on the Answers Forum: “Why isn’t the Windows RT 8.1 upgrade available in the Microsoft store?”

Apparently it took Microsoft about 48 hours to pull the upgrade. In a post without a time stamp on a rather obscure site, Microsoft issued this advisory:

Microsoft is investigating a situation affecting a limited number of users updating their Windows RT devices to Windows RT 8.1. As a result, we have temporarily removed the Windows RT 8.1 update from the Windows Store. We are working to resolve the situation as quickly as possible and apologize for any inconvenience. We will provide updates as they become available.

I’ve seen no further comment from Microsoft, no acknowledgment or description of the problem, and certainly no fix.

Ozzie Scott Williams, on his technical blog kickthatcomputer (“Annoying stuff I figured out /I really hate computers”), has come up with an ingenious workaround. Big problem: The method requires a USB recovery drive for your Windows RT computer, and few people have one sitting around.

However, following the steps he outlines, if you trust him (disclaimer: I don’t know Williams), you can create a Windows RT recovery USB drive. Using the recovery USB drive, there’s a way to bring up an old-fashioned command prompt, and type in a one-line command to rebuild the trashed BCD. Once the BCD is fixed, apparently Windows RT 8.1 will boot.

Score one for the DOS command line. Hard to believe it would bring a borked Surface RT back to life.

The other major, solvable Windows 8.1 bug I’ve seen makes it impossible to connect Internet Explorer to a Remote Web Access website running on a Small Business Server 2011 server.  Poster Yves describes it on the TechNet forum:

It is not possible to connect to the Remote Web Access Website… after you log in with your credentials you get a 404, some wrong redirects. It is always redirecting to “https://remote.domain.tld/~/logon?ReturnUrl=%2fremote%3f”. If you try after sucessfull logon to manually enter the correct URL “https://remote.domain.tld/remote/” you also get redirected to the above URL wich results in a 404. Firefox and Chrome doing it right. Any help is welcome, even better is if MS gets this fixed 😉

It ends up that enabling Compatibility Mode in IE for the site, and adding the site to your Trusted Sites list, will fix the problem.

The list of unanswered complainst about the upgrade goes on and on.

Microsoft isn’t distributing ISO files for the upgrades. If you have one machine, going to the Windows Store to download the upgrade isn’t difficult, as long as you have a fast Internet connection. But what about the organizations with 10 or 20 machines? Sure, if you have a Volume License, you can go that route, but downloading patches for 20 Surface RT machines? And why don’t the Windows 8.1 “Upgrading Windows only with a product key” keys work with the Win81 downloader? Microsoft’s just forcing people to use torrents.

(Solution for the nonworking upgrade keys: Install Windows 8 using the upgrade key, then apply the free update to Windows 8.1. Is that stupid, or what?)

Finally, there’s a laundry list of well-considered complaints about the Windows 8.1 update posted on the Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) thread that Microsoft engineers hosted three days ago. Here’s just a short collection:

• “Network management on Windows 7 was excellent, you could see which networks you had set up, if they were private or public, you could give them names so it was easy to manage. This is gone with Windows 8 or 8.1. How are we supposed to manage the networks now? If a user sets a public network as private I have no way of changing that, I have to use the registry (hard) or use third party software.”
• “Wireless networks once set up there is no easy way to manage them either. With Windows 7 you could easily do this, with Windows 8 you can’t. What’s the logic of this?”
• “Microsoft accounts seem on the way to being mandatory. We’re not there yet, but Windows 8.1 took a new step in that direction. I understand the benefits, but if you have to create accounts on a server for 50 users, and then create 50 Microsoft accounts with made-up data and throw-away emails, it’s of no use. Not to mention the concerns of having confidential data where you can’t control it (ejemNSAejem). So please, give a clear option to not use them and don’t bother the user anymore with them… During our testing (without ‘Microsoft accounts’), we couldnt install any app from the app store, not even demos or free apps. With stats revealing how little Metro apps get used/installed, you’d think MS would seek to promote use of the store much more, if just to ween out folks from the traditional desktop instead of making desktop apps the only ones they can install.”
• “There is no-way to automate [image backups] or use an external hard-drive for the backup. I used to go around an office after I set them up and run win7 backup. I’d copy all the images to a hard-drive and it would sit on a shelf until I needed it. On top of that, I’d automate a weekly image backup to a file server dedicated to desktop backups. It makes a smaller sys admin’s life 1,000,000 times easier when some highly configured computer (by an expensive consultant) takes a dump. I don’t believe I should have to buy extra software to do this as it was all available in windows 7 pro.”
• “In the age of SSDs, why is it that the Windows 8.1 update fails compatibility checks on Windows 8.0 if the Users folder has been redirected to another drive? What was the thinking on this? It’s really a show-stopper for people that want their applications on an SSD (C:) and their file storage on traditional media (hence the reason for redirecting the Users and/or Program Files folders). I can’t upgrade to 8.1 because of this.”

And my personal favorite:

• “Is there a setting for ‘I don’t have a touchscreen’ so that all of the touch stuff gets turned off?”

There are well over 1,000 comments and lots of food for thought.

I’m sure glad I wasn’t one of the ‘Softies responding to the comments.

This story, “Problems remain after Microsoft yanks Windows RT 8.1 update,” was originally published at InfoWorld.com. Get the first word on what the important tech news really means with the InfoWorld Tech Watch blog. For the latest developments in business technology news, follow InfoWorld.com on Twitter.