Windows Updates Tries to Install Office 2013 Patches After 2016 Install

[francescob]

there wasnt. it pretends to uninstall w/ a dialog box that pops up, then the MSI remains. i've tried three times to uninstall it.

The main MSI only accepts being removed by the Office setup which it automatically starts, if the setup window doesn't appear it could mean the setup files have been uninstalled but the MSIs (and likely all the installed files) haven't. The official guide I linked has the steps to manually remove the previous install but some instructions are generic (like removing the "0FF1CE" entries) and I think following those instructions could likely break the 2016 install so it's better to avoid that and try to have the Office setup handle the removal. Have you tried reinstalling Office 2013 and then uninstalling it? (preferably with the AV disabled during the uninstall). If that doesn't work you could also try rolling back to a previous snapshot when 2013 was still installed and then upgrade keeping 2013 and remove 2013 separately.

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

francescob - i see what youre saying, but let me update my status on this issue.

i simply uninstalled Office all together. it's gone; however, those pesky WUs still appear. i cant seem to get rid of them. Any method to finally remove them?

[Jim K Global Moderator]

Jason, I did not have the same issue as you (I did Office 2013 -> Office 2016 but on Win 7).  However, have you tried this "Reset Windows Update Agent" which is on Technet.  

https://gallery.technet.microsoft.com/scriptcenter/Reset-Windows-Update-Agent-d824badc

This script can be modificated to be compatible with others operative systems.

If you want to insert the latest version in Windows 10, change the "%version%==10.0.10565" section for the version you want . Example: ") else if %version%==10.0.10586 ( "

For more information about the version of system click here.

For more information about Windows Update Components click here.

To see the help of the tool, on the menu, press "?" and then press intro.

 

You'll have the following options (sorry...copying from the script)

echo.     1. Open the system protection. 
echo.     2. Scans all protected system files (Scannow). 
echo.     3. Scan the image to check for corruption (ScanHealth). 
echo.     4. Check the detected corruptions (CheckHealth). 
echo.     5. Repair the image (RestoreHealth). 
echo.     6. Clean up the superseded components (StartComponentCleanup). 
echo.     7. Reset Windows Update Components. 
echo.     8. Delete temporary files in Windows. 
echo.     9. Open the Internet Explorer options. 
echo.    10. Change invalid values in the Registry. 
echo.    11. Reset the Winsock settings. 
echo.    12. Search updates. 
echo.    13. Explore other local solutions. 
echo.    14. Explore other online solutions. 
echo.    15. Restart your PC. 

 So...option 7 and see what happens?  

 

[francescob]

i simply uninstalled Office all together. it's gone; however, those pesky WUs still appear. i cant seem to get rid of them. Any method to finally remove them?

That's why I told you to remove the MSIs. if Windows Update shows updates for Office it likely means it still detects the Office MSIs being installed. Just because the entry for Office disappeared from the Add/Remove programs window it doesn't mean that it's entirely gone. Have you tried reinstalling Office 2013 and then removing it as I said?

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

no, i havent tried reinstalling 2013.

also, i tried deleting the MSI's earlier, but remember there was one that refused to delete? anyway, i'll try that again, too.

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

i just tried that script from technet. didnt help.

i ran ccleaner to remove orphaned registry keys, i ran the file cleaner and manually deleted the Office15 folders from program files. that didnt help either. i, again, deleted the files in the SoftwareDistribution folder. that didnt help.

francescob - where were those instructions to manually delete the MSI files? i cant find it now.

[sinetheo]

As an IT professional:

 

... always always uninstall Windows/Office then reboot and install fresh. Never upgrade. You are just asking for problems. Supposedly Windows 10 was going to break the mold but I had all my start menu items vanish when I did my attempt. Never will I upgrade again.

So:

1. Uninstall Office

2. Reboot and open a cmd prompt as administrator and type c:\dism /online /cleanup-image /restore health

3. Reboot again. Open a cmd prompt as administrator again and type c:\sfc -SCANNOW

4. Install Office 2016

5. If that doesn't work. Go to the recovery tools and reset your pc/re-image from scratch (it is corrupted)

 

[sinetheo]

As an IT professional:

 

... always always uninstall Windows/Office then reboot and install fresh. Never upgrade. You are just asking for problems. Supposedly Windows 10 was going to break the mold but I had all my start menu items vanish when I did my attempt. Never will I upgrade again.

So:

1. Uninstall Office

2. Reboot and open a cmd prompt as administrator and type c:\dism /online /cleanup-image /restore health

3. Reboot again. Open a cmd prompt as administrator again and type c:\sfc -SCANNOW

4. Install Office 2016

5. If that doesn't work. Go to the recovery tools and reset your pc/re-image from scratch (it is corrupted)

 

Also download the Windows update fixit tool from Microsoft's website? 

You may have old stale .cab files from update which tried to install when you rebooted after you installed office 2016. It will clean up the temp files

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

As an IT professional:

 

... always always uninstall Windows/Office then reboot and install fresh. Never upgrade. You are just asking for problems. Supposedly Windows 10 was going to break the mold but I had all my start menu items vanish when I did my attempt. Never will I upgrade again.

the HUP version of Office does not allow for a fresh install. You run their small installer program, and everything is downloaded and installed automatically. this is exactly like google chrome.

[T3X4S]

I thought there was a way to do clean install

[francescob]

 

no, i havent tried reinstalling 2013.

also, i tried deleting the MSI's earlier, but remember there was one that refused to delete? anyway, i'll try that again, too.

You must NOT delete the MSI file if it's still installed. You must try to uninstall it first. If it fails to uninstall because it's a custom MSI that allows removal only by being invoked by its own bundled uninstaller, like in the Office case, then the cleanest approach is to just reinstall Office and then uninstall it again (or to roll back to a system restore snapshot where it was still installed and then uninstall it). If that doesn't work the official guide I had linked in the first post has all the steps to remove everything by hand but it's a pretty messy procedure and should really be used as last resource.

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

last night i just reinstalled 2013 again. i was then able to install all of the missing updates. im just going to leave it as-is for now. Eventually when i want to upgrade again, i'll try to uninstall 2013 and run that HUP-version installer. What a pain...

[+Neowin User 007 Subscriber²]

Use Revo Uninstaller to Force Uninstall of 2013.

There's issues with things like Skydirve from 2013 or say Visio 2013 making those updates pop up, even if you don't have the rest of 2013 installd anymore.

[brigmill]

Anybody ever come up with a solution to this problem? We're steadily going through 2016 from 2013 upgrades at my company, and I already see this happening on 3 computers. I've completely removed Office 2013 from all the machines, rebooted, downloaded a clean uninstall program from the Microsoft website, tried most of the things from this thread on the pc I use...still only loading 2013 updates and I have zero 2016 updates on my pc. For whatever reason, windows update thinks I only have Office 2013. Odd.

[Jason S. Global Moderator]

Yes, i solved this by uninstalling 2016 and reinstalling 2013. i completely updated 2013 then uninstalled it. after that, i installed 2016 and its updates. this solved the problem. it's horrible that the actual upgrades dont work. i'll just have to remember this for the future. make sure to uninstall the previous version 1st.

 

im going to close this thread as it's quite old now. Brigmill - if you need further assistance, please start a new post.