The push-button roller coaster continues as Microsoft again introduces the KB5001649 out-of-band update to users via Windows Update.
After installing the March 2021 Patch Tuesday updates, users began to report that Windows 10 would crash when graphics or printing elements were missing, had blank pages, or other issues.
To fix these issues, Microsoft released two out-of-band emergency updates for Windows 10 on March 15 – KB5001567 to fix the crashes and on March 18 KB5001649 to fix the printing issues.
For those who did not install the KB5001567 update, the KB5001649 update replaced it when it was released.
Unfortunately, many users reported that they could not install the update and ” We were unable to install this update, but you may get errors (0x80070541) ‘again in Windows Update.
Yesterday we reported that Microsoft has stopped implementing the KB5001649 update. Instead, all of our devices and virtual machines are suddenly re-offering the previous KB5001567 update.
When we got to Microsoft to ask why the implementation was stopped, they just told us that they were fixing the printers.
“We are working to resolve issues that some customers experience when printing from certain apps.”
This afternoon, BleepingComputer and Windows Latest confirmed that Microsoft has resumed the Windows 10 OOB KB5001649 optional update.
It’s not known what changes Microsoft, if any, made to the update, but tests performed by BleepingComputer showed that Windows Update installed the update without displaying 0x80070541 errors.
If you are affected by the printing issues, you can install the update now, hopefully with greater success than last time.