Are you *sure* you need to rebuild the WMI Repository?
To continue the subject of WMI troubleshooting: I am always frustrated at the quick, shotgun method of rebuilding the WMI repository as a rote, rudimentary troubleshooting step. This is very dangerous and risky. Rebuilding the WMI repository manually has resulted in some 3rd party products not working until reinstallation – IN SOME CASES – even this does not work. This is especially a shame since it may not always be necessary and even if it were – if there is severe WMI corruption, it may almost be better to “in-place” upgrade the OS or do a complete reinstallation of the operating system and software as incomplete repositories can yield lingering problems.
Before you go down that road, ask yourself the following:
1.) Have I properly troubleshot the error to the point that the only possible source could be corruption?
2.) Have I researched and installed all of the latest service packs and hotfixes related to WMI? (Hint: Go to https://support.microsoft.com and search WMI, hotfix, and <OS>)
3.) Have I gone through the rudimentary WMI checklist so I don’t get burned by simple things such as firewall rules? (Hint – https://madvirtualizer.wordpress.com/2014/01/22/the-importance-of-troubleshooting-wmi-part-2/)
4.) Have I ran WMIDiag (https://www.microsoft.com/download/en/details.aspx?displaylang=en&id=7684)
and received really bizarre errors like 0×80041010 WBEM_E_INVALID_CLASS or does it fail to connect at all?
5.) Do you fail to connect to WMI Control from Computer Management?
If you answered “yes” to 4 out of the 5 above, here are some steps you can do to safely troubleshoot the WMI repository using “soft” actions:
Instructions for Operating Systems Prior to Windows Vista (XP/2003)
1. Open the Services MSC console and stop the Windows Management Instrumentation service.
2. You will be prompted to stop dependent services. Click “Yes” on the prompt.
3. Once the service is stopped, browse to %SystemRoot%\System32\wbem. Rename the Repository folder to Repository.old.
4. Once the folder has been renamed, restart the WMI and dependent services in the following order:
Windows Management Instrumentation
SMS Agent Host (If SCCM/SMS is installed)
Windows Firewall / Internet Connection Sharing (ICS)
Any other services that were detected as dependencies
5. Once services have restarted, verify the Repository folder has been recreated. Now bear in mind, it could take up to one hour for WMI to fully rebuild.
Instructions for Windows Vista and Later (2008/Win7/2008 R2/Win8)
1. Open an elevated command prompt.
2. Verify the WMI repository is not corrupt by running the following command:
winmgmt /verifyrepository
If the repository is not corrupted, a “WMI Repository is consistent” message will be returned. If you get something else, go to step 3. If the repository is consistent, you need to troubleshoot more granularly. The repository is not the problem.
3. Run the following commands to repair WMI:
winmgmt /salvagerepository
If the repository salvage fails to work, then run the following command to see if it resolves the issue:
winmgmt /resetrepository
After the last command, there should be a “WMI Repository has been reset” message returned that verifies the command was successful.
Even the above commands should be a last resort if you are getting an error related to “Access Denied” or “RPC Server unavailable.”