WSUS File and Update Cleanup

[pwetter]

I have noticed that my WSUSContent is growing like crazy and is not cleaning out Declined updates.  Is there a maintenance process, other than the WSUS cleanup wizard, that I should be running to clean these files up?  We have over 200GB of files in the WSUSContent.  Doesn't seem quite right.  Does all that content need to stick around?

[Justin Chalfant (Patch My PC)]

Have you tried the option in the advanced tab to cleanup unreferenced updates? The WSUS clenaup wizard should help for declined updates.

You can also enable data deduplication to reduce the size by quite a bit because there are a few different copies stored for each update.

[pwetter]

In advanced, "Show unreferenced WSUS folders" collects data for a minute and then returns no entries.

Running "C:\Program Files\Update Services\Tools\WsusUtil.exe" listunreferencedpackagefolders returns about 200 folders worth about 15GB.

Running the "Modify Updates Wizard" produces 961 updates.  Of these, 658 are declined.  On the declined updates, the option to "Delete" is always grayed out no matter which or how many I select.

Spot checking these, all these declined updates have guid content folders in the WSUSContent\UpdateServicesPackages.
Example Declined Updates that Remain (with content):
* Apple iTunes 12.10.0.7 (x64)
* Apple iTunes 12.10.0.7 (x86)
* Apple iTunes 12.10.1.4 (x64)
* Apple iTunes 12.10.1.4 (x86)
* Apple iTunes 12.9.5.7 (x64)
* Apple iTunes 12.9.5.7 (x86)
* Apple iTunes 12.9.4.102 (x64)
* Apple iTunes 12.9.4.102 (x86)

WSUS cleanup wizard ran again today (all boxes checked), recovered less than 1 GB.

While i have no doubt that deduplication will help, to me, it is not a fix to the housecleaning issue.

[Wes Mitchell]

Please take a look at this to see some of the advanced options of our service. https://patchmypc.com/advanced-configurations-available-using-the-registry-for-patch-my-pcs-publishing-service

[pwetter]

Continuing this issue as I never really resolved it.  To me, it looks like old updates are never going away even after they are declined/superseded.  In the below screenshot, you will see an example.  Adobe Acrobat DC Updates for 15.006.30xxx and 17.011.301xx.  All of these updates are superseded and declined.  When I check the .\WSUSContent\UpdateServicesPackages\GUID for each of the content IDs/GUIDs, the content still exists for each of them.  I have run the cleanup wizard multiple multiple times.  Should this content be remaining?  My WSUSContent has grown to almost 300 GB in the last year because of this and continues to grow.  What supported house cleaning can be done to get rid of these superseded, declined updates and content?

Yes, you have the delete option.  But, it carries a warning about "Hash issues" and doesn't seem to be made for what I am experiencing.  please provide guidance.

[Justin Chalfant (Patch My PC)]

This should help with cleanup https://patchmypc.com/clean-up-third-party-updates-from-the-wsus-updateservicespackages-folder

[pwetter]

Yes, That is exactly what I needed Justin.  Excellent video tutorial on how WSUS works and how to do the cleanup.

Thanks much!

[pwetter]

Also, one item to note with running "C:\Program Files\Update Services\Tools\WsusUtil.exe" listunreferencedpackagefolders.

because we are using fully qualified names to the network share for wsus content in my environment, the command splits a path into 2 lines (example below).  This in turn breaks it in your utility and displays no unreferenced packages (is my guess anyway).

Code Select Expand

The following folders are not referenced by any of the updates in your
WSUS
server.
\\MySCCMServer.this.myfulldomain.com\WSUS\WSUSContent\UpdateServicesPackages\001
ea6e7-fe5a-48a5-91a1-9effbd2e2abc
\\MySCCMServer.this.myfulldomain.com\WSUS\WSUSContent\UpdateServicesPackages\004
5918e-fce7-44ac-ade4-63c4cad00c8c
\\MySCCMServer.this.myfulldomain.com\WSUS\WSUSContent\UpdateServicesPackages\009
0ba5c-e858-4fe8-a291-b4362c351a30

[Justin Chalfant (Patch My PC)]

Interestingly, we will see if we can improve this.