Microsoft tests new Windows 11 tool to remotely fix boot crashes

[xrobwx71]

Microsoft has begun testing a new Windows 11 tool called Quick Machine Recovery, which is designed to remotely deploy fixes for buggy drivers and configurations that prevent the operating system from starting.

The tool is part of Microsoft's Windows Resiliency Initiative, an effort to enhance system stability and reduce downtime by introducing automated tools and features to detect, diagnose, and fix critical failures in Windows 11.

"With system failures, devices can sometimes get stuck in the Windows Recovery Environment (Windows RE), severely impacting productivity and often requiring IT teams to spend significant time troubleshooting and restoring affected machines," explains Microsoft.

"With quick machine recovery, when a widespread outage affects devices from starting properly, Microsoft can broadly deploy targeted remediations to affected devices via Windows RE—automating fixes and quickly getting users to a productive state without requiring complex manual intervention."

On Friday, Microsoft released the Quick Machine Recovery to Windows Insider Preview Beta Channel, so Insiders can start testing the tool.

SOURCE

 

[HCHTech]

From the pic in the article: "Formerly known as Startup Repair". Well, I hope it works better than Startup Repair did - I can't think of an instance where Startup Repair fixed a problem.

 

[Mick]

From the pic in the article: "Formerly known as Startup Repair". Well, I hope it works better than Startup Repair did - I can't think of an instance where Startup Repair fixed a problem.

Heh - bring back MSDART....

 

[timeshifter]

"With quick machine recovery, when a widespread outage affects devices from starting properly, Microsoft can broadly deploy targeted remediations to affected devices via Windows RE—automating fixes and quickly getting users to a productive state without requiring complex manual intervention."

In other words, if they had this in place when the Crowdstrike bug brought half the Internet down it could have been fixed much easier.

 

[britechguy]

if they had this in place when the Crowdstrike bug brought half the Internet down it could have been fixed much easier

Which is probably one, among many, motivating factors in doing this. Hindsight is always 20/20.

Now, let's see if it actually works in practice as it's claimed to work.

 

[xrobwx71]

In other words, if they had this in place when the Crowdstrike bug brought half the Internet down it could have been fixed much easier.

This new tool comes in response to the faulty CrowdStrike update that caused millions of Windows devices worldwide to suddenly crash with a Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) and enter reboot loops in July 2024.

From the same article.

 

[frase]

So essentially a rollback tool, I think someone somewhere is still looking at a loop.

 

[Sky-Knight]

In other words, if they had this in place when the Crowdstrike bug brought half the Internet down it could have been fixed much easier.

If they bothered to require AV vendors the same level of maturity and integrity they impose on PRINTER DRIVERS, we'd not have had this situation either.

Instead they blame some obscure court in the EU, that simply told them... umm Microsoft, if you do that, you need to make sure everyone plays by the same rules, even your shiny new AV product.

MS of course interpreted this as, EU court no let us make our product better waaaaaa!

Shutting that little bit of propaganda down at Ignite last year was rather fun, even if it didn't win me many friends. The security people were OK with it, the infrastructure people... not so much.

Nice to have a new tool, but honestly, I haven't seen an endpoint get locked into a boot loop in ages. I never trusted CrowdStrike, because its CEO was the CTO of McAffee when they last blew up the Internet. The man has obviously learned nothing...

But still, it'll be nice to have a rollback for driver installations, but typically this sort of thing is found on the intake bench with a new rig, unit is repaired / replaced before it ships. So how much use does this tool see? Again, glad to have anything against that terrible day, but I don't see getting much use out of it personally. Time will tell.