Workaround for 0x80248015 when trying to do Windows Updates on Server 2003

If you’re like us you probably noticed this patch Tuesday that a bunch, if not all, of your Windows 2003 servers are not able to load the Microsoft Update page. When trying to load the page the error 0x80248015 is displayed.

After some Googling I’ve pieced together a workaround that will get you some updates this patch Tuesday. It seems switching back to Windows Update does the trick.

To switch back to Windows Update you just need to do the following:

1. Login to the server
2. Run ‘services.msc’
3. Stop the ‘Automatic Update’ service
4. Delete C:\Windows\SoftwareDistrabution
5. Start the ‘Automatic Update’ service
6. Launch ‘Internet Explorer’ and click ‘Tools’ and ‘Windows Update’
7. Use Windows Updates. DO NOT upgrade to Microsoft Update

OR if you’re like me and don’t want to have to do that for 50+ servers you can do it from a batch file:

net stop wuauserv
rd /s /q %SystemRoot%\SoftwareDistribution
net start wuauserv
%SystemRoot%\system32\wupdmgr.exe