Question: I noticed when doing a manual Windows Updates using Control Panel it finds the updates fast enough but after selecting updates I want to install and asking to install them takes forever to Download updates and no progress indicated, but if I click the start icon after some time it shows the updates are ready to install if I Shut Down the PC, indicated by the yellow Bang. No indication of what updates are ready to install either.

If I let the Windows update run on downloading, it will eventually download and install the selected updates but still no progress indicated, but takes hours. I see this behavior on some (4) my W7 PC's (7).

Its like the Windows Update screen does not refresh.

Any insight to this behavior or how to solve it?

Fully updated Windows 7 64bit prior to this months (Aug 2016) patch Tuesday.

Note: Home network, Fios with no other issues. Its wide spread on several computers and does it on any of them when I travel with those devices also, it is a windows update gui issue. Happens on Normal month to month updates.

[![enter image description here](https://i.stack.imgur.com/SCscq.jpg)](https://i.stack.imgur.com/SCscq.jpg)

This has nothing to do with "checking" for updates [as answered in this question](https://superuser.com/questions/951960/windows-7-sp1-windows-update-stuck-checking-for-updates) I answered this question myself but this is an entirely different issue and have found no solution so far.

Note:

**This issue does not happen anymore since MS started rolling out servicing stack updates. for Windows Update issues after a Clean install of W7 see my post over here>>>>>**[Windows 7 SP1 Windows Update stuck checking for updates](https://superuser.com/questions/951960/windows-7-sp1-windows-update-stuck-checking-for-updates/1022204#1022204)

Answer: 
This is **not** a permanent fix but if there's a particular update you need asap and don't have time to sort out something permanent at the moment you can use.

<https://catalog.update.microsoft.com/>

You need to use IE. Do that then disable the Windows Update service.

Then sort out a permanent fix when you have the time.
The "Download pending" could also be due to expired / damaged certificates.
Considering that Windows 7 and Windows 10 are pretty much suffering from similar decisions when looking at Windows Update, I'd like to contribute a further possible solution.

Just in case you want to rely on tools included in Windows, feel free to check the Event Log -> Application for "CertificateServicesClient-AutoEnrollment" with ID 64 and a criticality of "Warning".
Alternatively, you can get a detailed error code using the Windows Update Minitool, which is basically a 3rd party tool interfacing with Windows Update.
For me, both Windows Update and the Windows Store seemingly started downloading but got stuck at "Download pending" and would not continue or show an error code.
The Windows Update Minitool finally gave me two error codes, the important of them being:

* 0x80240022 (which turns out to be certificate related, i.e. the certificate expired or certificate chain broke)

The solution seems to be rather simple, if you are able to find a working manual.
[Kaspersky is offering a rather decent one over here](https://support.kaspersky.com/13727).
This is especially helpful, as the rootsupd.exe tool is rather difficult to find.
And despite Kaspersky telling you to get the certificate store backup from a working device, feel free to just get the [latest list of certificates](http://ctldl.windowsupdate.com/msdownload/update/v3/static/trustedr/en/authrootstl.cab) from Microsoft.
For some reason, I was not able to use those certificates without rootsupd.exe - the certificate management applet would show the certificate list, but would deem it broken.
When I used the rootsupd.exe to extract and import the contents of authrootstl.cab, my Windows Update finally started working again.