Installation of Windows 2003 Service pack fails when WMI breaks

Source: Microsoft Support

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The installation of Windows 2003 Service pack failed, and you received the following error:

"An error in updating your system occurred. click ok to continue"

In the SVCPACK.Log file, you see lines similar to the followings:

1142.453: Starting process: C:\WINDOWS\system32\wbem\mofcomp.exe C:\WINDOWS\system32\wbem\wlbsprov.mof
1142.860: Return Code = 3
1142.860: Starting process: C:\WINDOWS\system32\wbem\mofcomp.exe C:\WINDOWS\system32\wbem\cimwin32.mof
1145.375: Return Code = 3

609.688: DoInstallation:RunInfProcesses for ProcessesToRun Failed
609.688: Service Pack 2 Setup encountered an error: An error in updating your system has occurred.

This normally happens when there are issues with WMI.

1. If the WMI service is not started, try to start it. Then test to see if the issue is resolved.

2. Troubleshoot the WMI issue. For more information about how to do this, visit the following Microsoft Web site:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/topics/help/wmidiag.mspx

Workaround:

A workaround to this is to rebuild the WMI Repository.
Warning: This is not suitable if there is critical data stored in the WMI namespace because rebuilding will lose the data. Also, the namespaces of non-Windows products are not rebuilt using the steps below. For example, Exchange WMI namespaces would not regenerate after rebuilding, and this may require a reinstallation of Exchange.

1. Back up the WBEM folder (%windir%\system32\wbem) and then copy the WBEM folder from a freshly installed computer with the same version and service pack level.

2. Run the following steps in a command prompt:

cd %windir%\system32\wbem
for /f %s in ('dir /b *.dll') do regsvr32 /u /s %s
for /f %s in ('dir /b *.dll') do regsvr32 /s %s
wmiprvse /regserver
winmgmt /regserver

For more information about Windows Management Instrumentation, refer to the link below:

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/community/en-us/management/wmi_faq.mspx