User finds fix for those experiencing issues with the patch

Apr 23, 2015 07:07 GMT  ·  By

As we’ve reported to you earlier this week, one of the updates that Microsoft shipped as part of the Patch Tuesday rollout is causing issues on a number of Windows 7 computers because it fails to install, so those who can’t work on a PC with pending updates are obviously trying all sorts of workarounds.

Such a solution was proposed by Microsoft user AH_2015 in a discussion thread on the Community forums, suggesting that removing and reinstalling Internet Explorer could indeed fix all the problems you might be experiencing with KB3038314.

For starters, KB3038314 is an Internet Explorer 11 patch that fails to install on Windows 7 and judging by the number of complaints posted online, it turns out that this is one widespread problem. Microsoft, on the other hand, has remained completely tight-lipped on this issue, so user workarounds are the only ones we have right now.

How to fix KB3038314 issues

The Microsoft Community forums user claimed that installing all updates without KB3038314 and then removing and reinstalling Internet Explorer could fix installation issues with this particular patch. Several other users have already confirmed that this works, but for the moment, it’s hard to tell if it’s indeed effective on all computers or only on some.

Here are all steps that AH_2015 suggested:

- Installed all updates with only KB3038314 left to install. - Installed IE10 + reboot (which has KB3038314 installed via the update process in the setup) - Uninstalled IE10 + reboot (left me with IE8 RTM) - Installed IE11 through the offline installer with switch /update-no so that no updates are installed during setup. - After restart IE11 RTM is installed and 3 updates are available, KB3038314, KB3021952, KB2961851. They install without trouble.

If this doesn’t work for you, then it’s worth mentioning that Microsoft is already aware of the KB3038314 issues and is now working on a fix, but information as to when this could be released is yet to be provided.