What is causing "The creation of a shadow copy has timed out"?

Question

I have Windows 7 Home Premium and I get the error "The Creation of a shadow copy has timed out. Try this operation again. (0x81000101)". I also get updates not completing. Trying to restart to complete an update will cause the computer to hang.

What might be the problem?

Answer 1

Hi,

1.       When exactly do you receive the error message?

2.       Did you make any changes to the computer prior to the issue?

Follow the steps provided below and check for the issue.

Step 1: Restart the computer in Safe mode.

Follow the steps provided below to restart the computer in safe mode with networking.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows7/Start-your-computer-in-safe-mode

**Step 2:**Restart the computer in clean boot to check if any third party application is causing the issue.

Follow the steps provide in the below article to perform clean boot. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/929135

Note: Make sure to restart the computer back to normal startup follow step 7 in the link.

Step 3: Verify if these two services are running:

1.    Volume Shadow Copy service

2.    Windows backup

Also ensure that their dependency services are running. You can check this information from services.msc. Follow the steps below to check the services.

a)      Go to start and type services.msc in the search field.

b)      Locate the two services.

c)       Right-Click on the service one at a time.

d)      Select properties.

e)      Go to Dependencies Tab.

f)       Note the dependency services.

g)      Make sure they’re also running.

h)      To start a service, right click on it and select start.

Step 4: Turn off system restore and check if that helps.

Access the link below and follow the steps to turn System Restore on or off.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/Turn-System-Restore-on-or-off

Hope this is helpful.