Tried to gpupdate /force but getting "Processing Group Policy failed" error. DFS looks fine

Question

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.3.9600]
(c) 2013 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

C:\Users\Administrator>gpupdate /force
Updating policy...

Computer policy could not be updated successfully. The following errors were enc
ountered:

The processing of Group Policy failed. Windows attempted to read the file \\repr
o.local\SysVol\repro.local\Policies\{318003EA-482D-4AB1-A3BB-B9FE9D28BDDB}\gpt.i
ni from a domain controller and was not successful. Group Policy settings may no
t be applied until this event is resolved. This issue may be transient and could
 be caused by one or more of the following:
a) Name Resolution/Network Connectivity to the current domain controller.
b) File Replication Service Latency (a file created on another domain controller
 has not replicated to the current domain controller).
c) The Distributed File System (DFS) client has been disabled.
User Policy could not be updated successfully. The following errors were encount
ered:

The processing of Group Policy failed. Windows attempted to read the file \\repr
o.local\SysVol\repro.local\Policies\{318003EA-482D-4AB1-A3BB-B9FE9D28BDDB}\gpt.i
ni from a domain controller and was not successful. Group Policy settings may no
t be applied until this event is resolved. This issue may be transient and could
 be caused by one or more of the following:
a) Name Resolution/Network Connectivity to the current domain controller.
b) File Replication Service Latency (a file created on another domain controller
 has not replicated to the current domain controller).
c) The Distributed File System (DFS) client has been disabled.

To diagnose the failure, review the event log or run GPRESULT /H GPReport.html f
rom the command line to access information about Group Policy results.

C\Users\Administrator>ping reprodc01

Pinging REPRODC01.repro.local [fe80::5924:488b:ac47:1533%13] with 32 bytes of da
ta:
Reply from fe80::5924:488b:ac47:1533%13: time<1ms
Reply from fe80::5924:488b:ac47:1533%13: time<1ms
Reply from fe80::5924:488b:ac47:1533%13: time<1ms
Reply from fe80::5924:488b:ac47:1533%13: time<1ms

Ping statistics for fe80::5924:488b:ac47:1533%13:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 0ms, Maximum = 0ms, Average = 0ms

C:\Users\Administrator>gpupdate /force
Updating policy...

Computer policy could not be updated successfully. The following errors were enc
ountered:

The processing of Group Policy failed. Windows attempted to read the file \\repr
o.local\SysVol\repro.local\Policies\{318003EA-482D-4AB1-A3BB-B9FE9D28BDDB}\gpt.i
ni from a domain controller and was not successful. Group Policy settings may no
t be applied until this event is resolved. This issue may be transient and could
 be caused by one or more of the following:
a) Name Resolution/Network Connectivity to the current domain controller.
b) File Replication Service Latency (a file created on another domain controller
 has not replicated to the current domain controller).
c) The Distributed File System (DFS) client has been disabled.
User Policy could not be updated successfully. The following errors were encount
ered:

The processing of Group Policy failed. Windows attempted to read the file \\repr
o.local\SysVol\repro.local\Policies\{318003EA-482D-4AB1-A3BB-B9FE9D28BDDB}\gpt.i
ni from a domain controller and was not successful. Group Policy settings may no
t be applied until this event is resolved. This issue may be transient and could
 be caused by one or more of the following:
a) Name Resolution/Network Connectivity to the current domain controller.
b) File Replication Service Latency (a file created on another domain controller
 has not replicated to the current domain controller).
c) The Distributed File System (DFS) client has been disabled.

To diagnose the failure, review the event log or run GPRESULT /H GPReport.html f
rom the command line to access information about Group Policy results.

C:\Users\Administrator>gpupdate /force

Answer 1

Hi @Jonathan Nali

Start by checking if the file gpt.ini exist in Sysvol and it's reacheable from impacted machine:

\\repr o.local\SysVol\repro.local\Policies\{318003EA-482D-4AB1-A3BB-B9FE9D28BDDB}\gpt.i ni

If the gpt.ini is missing,run the following command to identify the name of the GPO mentioned in the error message:

Get-GPO -Guid 318003EA-482D-4AB1-A3BB-B9FE9D28BDDB-Domain "domainName.local"

To fix missing gpt.ini file, you can try one of the following sollution:

• Modify one setting on impacted GPO and when you click on apply the file will be generated automatically
• Restore GPO from backup
• Export GPO settings , remove it , then create new one and import Exported settings from deleted GPO

Please don't forget to mark helpful answer as accepted

Answer 2

I've been plagued by this many times. I finally stumbled upon the fix - assuming everything is NORMALLY working fine, this should fix the problem.

Test-ComputerSecureChannel -Repair
Reset-ComputerMachinePassword -Credential domain\adminuser
gpupdate /force