Reports are coming in that the Windows 10 KB4532693 cumulative update is loading an incorrect user profile and causing the user's desktop and Start Menu to be reset to default.
On February 11th, Microsoft released the Windows 10 v1909 and v1903 KB4532693 cumulative update as part of their February Patch Tuesday updates.
Since then, reports are starting to come in that after installing the update, some users state that their normal user profile is missing, their desktop files are missing, and everything was reset to default.
I first learned about this when a user posted in our Windows 10 Cumulative Updates KB4532693 post stating that their brother's computer experienced this problem after installing the update.
After doing some research, I also saw similar issues being reported in the Microsoft forums [1, 2, 3] where users installed the update and after logging in found their desktop files missing and the Start Menu reset.
"Hello. Sorry to post a random question here, but a bit new at this. Just installed the latest Feb 2020 Windows 10 updates. Upon completion it appears to have reset the display to default windows system. That is, all custom icons missing, background returned to windows logo, would not recognise my logon, set a temp logon."
Günter Born of Borncity posted about this problem happening to some of his readers and also linked to a different Microsoft Forums post titled "why has the latest windows update moved all my files into another user folder ending in .000?"
Born also mentions a tweet by Woody Leonhard where someone had experienced a similar issue.
In this case, a family member's account was being loaded into a temporary profile and their original profile had been renamed. After some Registry editing and folder renaming, the user was able to recover the profile and get things back to normal.
Loading into a temporary profile?
Based on the reports by affected users, it appears that a bug in the KB4532693 update is loading up a temporary profile to be used during the update process and failing to restore the user's profile when done.
The good news is that the update is not wiping your data, but rather renaming the original user profile in the C:\Users folder. If you are affected by this issue, you can look in C:\Users and see if you have a renamed profile ending in .000 or .bak.
Unfortunately, restoring a profile through Registry edits may be a very difficult and risky task for many people.
As some people stated that they could resolve the issue by restarting Windows a few times or uninstalling the KB4532693 update, it is safer to go down this route first if you are affected by this issue.
In a statement to BleepingComputer, Microsoft stated “We are aware of the issue and are investigating the situation."
Comments
Amigo-A - 1 week ago
They did not need to engage in corporate extortion and demand to switch to Windows 10. They mess up in full. Where is the bright side now, where is the dark side? They no have a gold middle.
GT500 - 1 week ago
No bright light at the end of the tunnel, huh?
Warthog-Fan - 1 week ago
Almost 5 years and Microsoft is still botching Windows 10 updates and causing problems for their user base. Maybe they'll get it right by the time Windows 10 goes EOL.
buddy215 - 1 week ago
Good reason to block updates for at least a week. Allowing Microsoft to fix multiple bugs causing multiple problems. Some of us who mainly use another OS have the luxury of waiting for Microsoft to repair its updates. Others....put themselves at risk by delaying security updates. It's almost a catch-22. Damned if you do....damned if you don't.
m00ntan - 1 week ago
Like the wheels falling off new car. Uninstalling the KB4532693 update didn't help and I don't see any temporary profiles. Who can point me to a solution?
Dominique1 - 1 week ago
Face it M$ lovers, this madness will never end! :facepalm:
Jazmac - 1 week ago
People are buggy and anything people create will be buggy. Get used to it.
Demonslay335 - 1 week ago
This was a semi-frequent bug with Windows 7 before, and I had written a batch script to fix it automatically in the registry (swapping the .bak profile). Had a few Windows 10 systems with this lately, but the same fix did not work for them. Ended up having to create a new user profile and transfer the data over.
Maybe someone can test this out and see if additional steps are needed for Window 10?
https://gist.github.com/Demonslay335/419adbae046729d8e33cdd191e281016
m00ntan - 1 week ago
Some users of Surface have no temporary accounts, and no restore points. Their data is gone. Let me be the first to say it's so.
jmwoods - 1 week ago
Doing "wait and watch" for updates, and having a current disk image (tested and known to be good) to restore from should be standard practices.
MichaelGEaglemeare - 1 week ago
Luckily I had a backup image to restore to that I made a few days before this Update'693 using AOMEI BackUpper via USB . I tried all kinds of workarounds and none of it worked, gets too time-consuming. Switched Update to Manual, at the least Pause for a couple of weeks.
NeoSciFiScribe - 1 week ago
I suspect the reason KB4532693 failed to install for me is that I was low on disk space on the C: drive. After spending four days suffering through the profile issue -- and trying a number of recommended solutions from a variety of sites -- I found someone on my third attempt with Microsoft Support (Chat Online) who walked me through an In-Place Update that fixed the problem! It even allowed KB4532693 to install correctly so there was no lingering issue with a future attempt at installation. With the complexity of my login profile, I knew simply migrating to a new account wasn't an option. Fortunately, this time that didn't need to happen.
Jaybo13 - 1 day ago
To prevent the KB4532693 update from being automatically reinstalled I found this to solve the problem, and it can work for other troublesome updates as well: https://pccommando.wordpress.com/2020/02/23/attention-everyone-the-update-kb4532693-that-has-broken-windows-10-and-the-best-solution-yet/