Frequency of DISM/SFC

likerain · 2025-06-20T06:41:25-0400

How often do you run DISM/SFC?
Also, how frequently does it actually repair any corruption?

I run DISM/SFC about once every two weeks, but today DISM reported system corruption, which left me feeling a bit disappointed.
I suddenly became curious about how often others run these tools and how frequently they detect system corruption.

spapakons · 2025-06-20T07:11:33-0400

I use Customizer God and Resource Hacker to replace the default Windows 11 system icons with those from Windows 7 and 8.1 which I find nicer. Using SFC it thinks the system files are compromised and replaces them with the original version cancelling all my customizations which I have to do again. So I run SFC and Dism only when absolutely necessary (hopefully never). Besides if there is no issues in Windows why use them? If it works don't fix it! You may accidentally introduce issues while your computer is working perfectly.

XxXxX · 2025-06-20T07:25:25-0400

likerain said:
How often do you run DISM/SFC?
Also, how frequently does it actually repair any corruption?

I run DISM/SFC about once every two weeks, but today DISM reported system corruption, which left me feeling a bit disappointed.
I suddenly became curious about how often others run these tools and how frequently they detect system corruption.

i use SFC after every patch Tuesday and thats about it.
best of luck, Steve ..

Kees · 2025-06-20T07:50:34-0400

likerain said:
How often do you run DISM/SFC?

Never!
Only when I have doubts about the correct functioning of the system, I would do that.
As long as the system keeps functioning without errors or slowdowns, I will not use DISM at all.
Not even as a regular habit after monthly Windows updates.
Just a matter of habit, I think.

likerain · 2025-06-20T09:04:47-0400

XxXxX said:
i use SFC after every patch Tuesday and thats about it.
best of luck, Steve ..

Thank you for your reply.
How frequently was damage detected in that scan?

gunrunnerjohn · 2025-06-20T09:19:40-0400

I only use it when I'm having some issues with Windows. Fortunately, I don't do a ton of customization that would be affected by SFC, so that's normally not an issue.

FrancoDT · 2025-06-20T10:46:12-0400

I've gotten in the habit of running them after every Windows update and find errors about 50 percent of the time after an update.

gunrunnerjohn · 2025-06-20T10:50:34-0400

FrancoDT said:
I've gotten in the habit of running them after every Windows update and find errors about 50 percent of the time after an update.

That would worry me some. I haven't run it in some time, and I just ran it out of curiosity. No issues found. I've had several system updates since the last run.

FrancoDT · 2025-06-20T10:53:58-0400

gunrunnerjohn said:
That would worry me some. I haven't run it in some time, and I just ran it out of curiosity. No issues found. I've had several system updates since the last run.

View attachment 137351

Don't know if your an insider but it seems to be quite common on insider downloads for many of us.

gunrunnerjohn · 2025-06-20T10:57:08-0400

FrancoDT said:
Don't know if your an insider but it seems to be quite common on insider downloads for many of us.

Nope, I have enough problems keeping the distribution version of Windows running!

Kees · 2025-06-20T11:49:07-0400

gunrunnerjohn said:
Nope, I have enough problems keeping the distribution version of Windows running!

That's exactly my point of view!

I only have one system running Windows 11 on it, so I would like to keep it far from insider versions.

Now and then out of curiosity I install an insider version, but always do that in VirtualBox environment, where I could delete the whole installation (or just the last version of it) in an instant. The last time I did that was about half a year ago (to learn what 24H2 was doing).

gunrunnerjohn · 2025-06-20T11:52:20-0400

It's exciting enough to sort out the problems with the distribution version of Windows, never mind the pre-release versions. I had my fill of that some years ago when I was on the bleeding edge. Predictably, I got bloodied a few times back then. :lmao:

garioch7 · 2025-06-20T12:25:18-0400

@likerain ,

Like @XxXxX , I only run SFC routinely on the Friday following a "Patch Tuesday." I also do a DISM . . . /scanhealth, and DISM . . . /analyzecomponentstore. If issue(s) are found, I the other appropriate DISM commands deal with the identified issue(s).

Other than once a month, I don't run those commands, unless I suspect a problem with Windows, which is seldom.

Have a great day.

Regards,
Phil

likerain · 2025-06-20T12:47:49-0400

garioch7 said:
@likerain ,

Like @XxXxX , I only run SFC routinely on the Friday following a "Patch Tuesday." I also do a DISM . . . /scanhealth, and DISM . . . /analyzecomponentstore. If issue(s) are found, I the other appropriate DISM commands deal with the identified issue(s).

Other than once a month, I don't run those commands, unless I suspect a problem with Windows, which is seldom.

Have a great day.

Regards,
Phil

Thank you for the information.
If you don't mind, could you tell me how often the DISM scan reports errors?

XxXxX · 2025-06-20T14:20:20-0400

likerain said:
Thank you for your reply.
How frequently was damage detected in that scan?

not often normally after a major update and to tell the truth i haven't kept track
but if errors are found its then i run DISM/restore, restart the system
then SFC the system again.

best of luck, Steve ..

pseymour · 2025-06-20T15:09:18-0400

I have a PowerShell script scheduled to run that does a ScanHealth every seven days. If the image is repairable, it does a RestoreHealth. When the image is healthy, it does an SFC scan with the same seven-day frequency. The computer I use the most, my system one, has needed a repair three times in the two and a half years that it's been in use.

I run a very similar process in the environment I manage, which is several thousand devices. We've had eighteen devices repaired in the last seven days, and that's a fairly normal rate for us.

garlin · 2025-06-20T18:26:37-0400

It's important to remember some DISM repairs may be caused by Windows Servicing Stack bugs, and not from random file corruption. If everyday file corruption was such a major issue, Windows would be crashing on a lot of machines.

spapakons · 2025-06-20T18:31:07-0400

File corruption is usually because of incomplete windows updates. The computer is shutdown or restarted before finishing install updates. Remember installing updates in Windows 7 at restart? If you couldn't wait and you reset or turn off the computer, Windows would be screwed and wouldn't be easy to fix it. Unless the disk is faulty of course (less than 100% health).

zbook · 2025-06-20T19:36:51-0400

likerain said:
how frequently does it actually repair any corruption?

It depends upon the definition of corruption.

If a file was expected to match another file and doesn't scannow reports it as a corruption.

When the file details are viewed there may be no corruption.

It may have been only a hash mismatch.

From Google AI:

https://www.google.com/search?q=hash+mismatch+defined&oq=hash+mismatch+defined&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOTIICAEQABgWGB4yDQgCEAAYhgMYgAQYigUyDQgDEAAYhgMYgAQYigUyDQgEEAAYhgMYgAQYigUyCggFEAAYogQYiQUyBwgGEAAY7wUyCggHEAAYgAQYogQyBwgIEAAY7wXSAQkyMDk3MGowajeoAgCwAgA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

garlin · 2025-06-20T19:51:23-0400

If you overwrite or remove a file that's part of the Windows distribution (sourced from WinSxS components), it's considered corruption.

SFC doesn't care why it got changed. Either the file matches what's listed in the manifest, or it doesn't.

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