KB4015552, KB4015553 April Previews for Windows 7 and 8.1

The April rollup update patches KB4015552 and KB4015553 have been released on Tuesday 18, 2017 for Windows 7 and Windows 8.1

Microsoft releases update previews on the third Tuesday of every month for the company's operating system's Windows 7 and Windows 8.1.

These previews are then released on the next Patch Day, the second Tuesday of the coming month for all users of these operating systems.

KB4015552 is available for Windows 7 Service Pack 1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 Service Pack 1 operating systems. KB4015553  is available for Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2.

The issue that AMD Carrizo DDR4 processors are detected as next gen processors has not been fixed in these updates. If you install the update rollup on a system with the processor, Windows will prevent the downloading and installation of future Windows Updates. Note: A bypass to unlock Windows Update functionality has been discovered recently.

Direct downloads

Direct downloads of the previews are provided on the Microsoft Update Catalog website.

• KB4015552 download for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2
• KB4015553 download for Windows 8.1 and Windows server 2012 R2

April 18, 2017—KB4015552 (Preview of Monthly Rollup)

• Addressed issue to improve the reliability of dual-controller storage systems.
• Addressed issue that prevents V2 Message Queuing (MSMQ) performance counters from returning data after a clustered resource failure or failover.
• Addressed issue to updated time zone information.

link to update history

April 18, 2017—KB4015553 (Preview of Monthly Rollup)

• Addressed an issue that may cause the WSMan Service (WsmSvc) to crash randomly when multiple Windows Remote Management (WinRM) requests are being executed in the WSMan Service.
• Addressed issue where the Event subscription service stops working, does not send events to the collector server, and drop events when using Windows Remote Management (WinRM) and event forwarding.
• Addressed high CPU utilization by the Wmiprvse.exe process on a computer that is running Windows 8.1 or Windows Server 2012 R2. If you run scripts or use software that queries WMI, the Wmiprvse.exe process may consume a lot of CPU resources even after you stop the script or software.
• Addressed issue where Hyper-V hosts may crash when performing incremental backups with Change Block Tracking (CBT) enabled.
• Addressed issue where the Network File System (NFS) server may not return all the directory entries to the NFS client that issues the ‘ls’ command using the NFS v3 protocol.
• Addressed issue where the read or write operation on a file that is being archived (converted) is declined, which causes a crash.
• Addressed issue where Active Directory servers become unresponsive and must be rebooted when they have a heavy load of services using group-managed service accounts (gMSAs).
• Addressed issue that caused backups to fail on Hyper-V clusters with CSV volumes enabled.
• Addressed issue where MPIO did not properly restore service after the check condition "Illegal request, LUN not available (sense codes 05/25/00)" occurs.
• Addressed issue where a node cluster experiences sporadic crashes during high I/O activities such as backup or maintenance windows. Error: Common bucket ID (WIN8_DRIVER_FAULT) - 0x3B_msiscsi!iSpReleaseConnectionReferences
• Addressed issue where the printer cannot print OPENGL rastered graphics after installing any of the following updates: KB3164035, KB3205394, KB3207752, KB3212646 and KB4012215.
  Updated the Access Point Name database.
• Addressed issue where the BADVERS return path is broken for queries with an unknown Extension Mechanisms for DNS (EDNS) version.
• Addressed issue that causes poor CPU performance when Virtual Switch Ports leak when a machine is migrated live from one host to another.
• Addressed issue where Internet Information Server returns an incorrect 500.19 internal server error for certain URIs.
• Addressed issue to updated time zone information.
• Addressed issue where thin clients connected to the server fail (STOP 0x3B) and unsaved data is lost.
• Addressed issue where an application that uses Windows Presentation Foundation technology, the mouse, and the touchscreen intermittently stop responding.
• Addressed issue where retrieval of the Certificate Revocation List (CRL) from Certification Authority (CA) using the Simple Certificate Enrollment Protocol (SCEP) fails.
• Addressed excessive memory usage in LSASS when evaluating an LDAP filter over a large record set on domain controllers.

link to update history

Closing Words

These preview patches are designed for organizations and system administrators mostly who need to test patches before they are deployed. While home users may download and install them as well, this is not advised unless they ship with essential fixes.