When to stop running DISM

Personally, I hold a greater opposing view that sfc and dism are mostly worthless. Run once to see if it helps. They do not fix everything eg they cannot fix the registry. Running anything 6x to try to fix things is 5x redundant. If something actually better happens on 2x-6x then rofl (the code apparently has an issue and can't do it on one which is not to be expected so don't ever expect that to fix anything - they shouldn't do anything that they didn't on the first try).

If once fails to help then your fix really is elsewhere. Either way too, if you have to run sfc or dism then you have another issue anyway as they really should never be needed.

I'd say full format and clean install the OS. Don't even try a reset or refresh. Anything you do like that or sfc, dism, chkdsk, they can only try to fix things but can't fully fix everything in the ultimate end. That's what clean install does and its the only thing that can (besides a problem with the hardware itself).

Hello, aReply4u.

Thanks for your information.

Per your link to

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/use-the-system-file-checker-tool-to-repair-missing-or-corrupted-system-files-79aa86cb-ca52-166a-92a3-966e85d4094e

it is very interesting that indeed it recommends:

"If you are running Windows 10, Windows 8.1 or Windows 8, first run the inbox Deployment Image Servicing and Management (DISM) tool prior to running the System File Checker."

That is the opposite order to advice I've seen elsewhere (unless that other advice had been for Windows 7?!).

In my case, after 3 iterations I'm still not sure whether DISM has truly resolved any problem (if there really is a problem).

Which of the following do you advise that I should try?

1. Keep running DISM until I get a report back that DISM found no problems, and then run SFC (until SFC reports no problems)?
2. Run SFC now (until SFC reports no problems); no need to run DISM again at all?
3. Run SFC now (until SFC reports no problems); then run DISM after that if there were any SFC reports of problems?

I also had an idea to compare the logs that DISM is (or might be) generating, to check whether there is anything at all changing between each iteration of running DISM. I get a feeling it could be just repeating the same thing over and over again.

But I'm not very keen to trawl through the logs, as — in my limited experience — they're very lengthy and can be hard to interpret.

—DIV

Forum volunteer

Is it okay to stop DISM How long should DISM take to run Should you run DISM or SFC first,.?

If you are running. Windows 8 windows 8.1 or 10

First run the inbox : Deployment Image Servicing and

Management (DISM) tool prior to running

the System File Checker

as cited above Microsoft advise to run DISM 1st and 2nd the

the Sfc /Scannow : But personally. I've applied both tools

Sfc /Scannow+DISM in opposite order & sometimes fixed

the bug, other times didn't : Experts advice run them 3 times

The below webPage explain. How to run and what these tools fix it

Link : **** https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/use-the-system

-file-checker-tool-to-repair-missing-or-corrupted-system-files

-79aa86cb-ca52-166a-92a3-966e85d4094e#:~:t****

I hold the opposite view to what Microsoft does and SFC is what you may need to run up to 3 times:

And these eightforums.com Tutorials are very detailed for problems resulting from SFC Scan:

"How to Run "SFC /SCANNOW" Command at Boot or in Windows 8 and 8.1"

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/3047-sfc-scannow-command-run-windows-8-a.html

Read this Section there in conjunction with the rest of the information they give in above link.

   Note

If SFC could not fix something, then run the command again to see if it may be able to the next time. Sometimes it may take running the sfc /scannow command 3 times restarting the PC after each time to completely fix everything that it's able to.

If not, then run the **Dism /Online /Cleanup-Image /RestoreHealth**command to repair any component store corruption,

Repair-WindowsImage -Online -CheckHealthRepair-WindowsImage -Online -ScanHealthRepair-WindowsImage -Online -RestoreHealth

Restart the PC afterwards, and try the sfc /scannow command again.

If still not, then try using OPTION ONE above to run the sfc /scannow command at boot

You can say that, AReply4u, but keep in mind that I've already run DISM six times (or maybe more), and as yet still haven't reached the point where it finds no errors, and from the logs it's not clear (to me) that there's actually any progress from one DISM run to the next DISM run.

Surely the advice cannot be to run DISM thousands of times, one after the other, without any benefit!

You also suggested that running DISM three times should be enough to reach the error-free state, but that's obviously not what I'm seeing.

—DIV