How do I find the WSUS server that my computers are connecting to for Windows Updates?

Question

I have multiple WSUS servers setup on our domain; one is handling Windows Updates, while another is setup to only do Endpoint Protection updates (via SCCM 2012). Endpoint Updates are working properly on all machines, while Windows Updates are only working on some. One those where it does not work, Windows Update still says, "You received updates: Managed by your system administrator"

Clients are all Windows 7 and the servers are 2008 R2 with SCCM 2012 on the one doing Endpoint Protection.

So I'm wondering if there is a way to check which server the clients are connecting to to pull their Windows Updates?

Answer 1

This information can be found in the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate\WUServer

To query it dircetly from the command line:

reg query HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate\

Answer 2

The registry key mentioned by jbsmith is the place to look for on the client itself.
You can also find the info in %WINDIR%\Windowsupdate.log
That logfile is also the place to check why updates failed to install.

Additionally: If you have access to the WSUS servers themselves you can use the management interface to see which machines registered with that particular server.

Answer 3

You can run the following registry query in command line:

reg query HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate

Which will then give you an output of something like the following:

WUServer    REG_SZ  http://WSUSServerName
WUStatusServer      REG_SZ  http://WSUSServerName
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate\AU

Some good reading for WSUS client problems can be found at the link below:

Clients Not Reporting

Answer 4

Simple solution here... a client can only be assigned to ONE WSUS Server. Whether it's a standalone WSUS server, or a Configuration Manager Software Update Point (SUP), does not matter -- but the limit is one.

The root cause here is the erroneous belief that the functionality of OS updates and FEP definition updates can be split across multiple WSUS servers for the same clients. It cannot.

Answer 5

On your WSUS server go to the computers node. Any computer that is pointed to that server will show up in that list.

But @Lawrence is right here. A computer can only be pointed to one WSUS server. You can have multiple servers, and you can target some machines to one or the other with group policy, but you can't split the updates so that OS updates come from one and virus defs from another. It doesn't work that way.

Answer 6

In powershell :

gp HKLM:\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate

Or more specifically :

gpv HKLM:\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\WindowsUpdate -n WUServer