Which ISO should I use to repair, and/or do a repair-install?

[Bob1212]

Hi, Jan. I hope you can help, as I've been struggling with this off and on since March 10th after being forced to upgrade to 19041.1. I now have several persistent problems, including not being able to do any more updates. The MS "Update Troubleshooter" fails, as also sfc (found bad DLLs, but can't repair) and DISM (is repairable, but source not found).

What I'd like to accomplish is to repair my Windows with DISM so I can install security updates whenever they arise. If that fails, I'd want to do a repair install and keep all my data. Since I have only a 1 Mb connection, I'd certainly prefer not doing multiple downloads. Since MediaCreationTool20H2.exe failed, I don't trust Microsoft tools and want to download an ISO manually.

Please tell me which ISO to use. I've not done this before. The MS forum is not very helpful. Should I go with the 2004 19041 version, because supposedly I need that to use with DISM? Must I use a 19041 ISO to repair my computer's 19041?

Or should I use the December 20H2 19042 version, and use that to repair or upgrade my Win 10 to 20H2?

Thanks for any advice.

--

Bob

P.S. Congratulations on at least getting the $9K from underhanded Amazon. That's quite a story.

P.P.S. In your software, there seems to be a bug which shows double entries for Dec 20H2 at the top.

[Jan Krohn]

Hi Bob,

I've never done much with DISM, so I can I can only tell you what I suspect would be the case.

I don't think that the 2004 DISM will work with the 20H2 ISO. However, it will definitely work with the 2004 ISO.

Now 21H1 is about to be released, and I think that could trigger another forced upgrade for old releases. If I remember right, these releases have a life span of 1.5 years, meaning, you can only use 2004 for another couple of months before the next forced upgrade is due. Therefore, it could be better to upgrade straight to 20H2, which will last 6 more months until early 2022.

Let me answer both your post in one reply since they're connected.

You don't need an active internet connection to do a repair upgrade. Just make sure the connection is offline before you start setup. In my experience, repair upgrades fix almost any issue with the Windows installation.

On 3/20/2021 at 3:28 PM, Bob1212 said:

P.S. Congratulations on at least getting the $9K from underhanded Amazon. That's quite a story.

And it's not over yet. After two years, my lawyer has finally made some progress on my data subject request, so let's wait and see what personal data Amazon has collected about me over the years.

On 3/20/2021 at 3:28 PM, Bob1212 said:

P.P.S. In your software, there seems to be a bug which shows double entries for Dec 20H2 at the top.

That's not a bug. The two files seem identical but have different product IDs, so I decided to keep both in the list, in case one of them should disappear without prior announcement from Microsoft.

[erpster9]

On 3/23/2021 at 3:59 AM, Jan Krohn said:

Now 21H1 is about to be released, and I think that could trigger another forced upgrade for old releases. If I remember right, these releases have a life span of 1.5 years, meaning, you can only use 2004 for another couple of months before the next forced upgrade is due. Therefore, it could be better to upgrade straight to 20H2, which will last 6 more months until early 2022.

speaking of the upcoming 21H1 release Jan, Microsoft has recently announced that they're getting ready to release it soon

Quote

We are preparing the Windows 10 May 2021 Update (version 21H1) for release. We believe that Build 19043.928 is the final build for the May 2021 Update, and the media for this build can be downloaded here.

there are also 21H1 preview ISOs (with build 19043.928) available from MS for Windows Insiders as noted by MS (the current Windows ISO downloader tool does not download these updated 21H1 ISOs though)

Edited April 30, 2021 by erpster9

[Jan Krohn]

I remember adding these builds a couple of days ago. There's no new version of the downloader needed to get them. These kind of changes are made by server updates.