I've set up two Windows Server 2022 virtual machines from the same template at different locations, and neither is domain joined. They were both properly sysprepped and configured before going live. Both are reporting to WSUS and are downloading and installing updates without issues. However, only one VM shows up in the WSUS console at a time. For instance, if XVM001 from site 1 is present in the console, YVM001 from site 2 disappears, and vice versa. Although both VMs can detect and install updates when checked directly, this odd visibility issue in WSUS has me stumped. Any insights or suggestions?
4 Answers
This sounds like a classic case of duplicate SID issues. It seems sysprep might not have worked correctly, and these VMs could still have the same SID stuck in the registry. If you didn't use the /oobe option, that could be the problem. Have you checked if that's the case?
Resetting the WSUS client ID could help since sysprep typically doesn’t reset it. I ran into a similar issue before and fixed it by re-registering the clients. Here’s a link that might help you: https://kc.jetpatch.com/hc/en-us/articles/360052777391-Remove-Duplicative-SusClientId-SUS-ID.
You might want to run the client-side script on both systems to sort this out. It's possible that sysprep didn't clear out all the necessary registry information that WSUS needs. Check out this resource for help: https://www.ajtek.ca/wsus/client-machines-not-reporting-to-wsus-properly/.
Sounds like you might have a duplicate ID problem. I've experienced this too, where only one server shows up at a time. Once I reset the WSUS client ID and had everything re-register, the issue resolved pretty quickly.
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