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Patch My PC Home Updater v5.4.5.0 Repeated local.dat Access Denied Errors
Resolved by Complete Application State Reset
Product:
Patch My PC Home Updater v5.4.5.0
Issue Description:
Multiple systems were reporting the following errors during application startup and catalog refresh operations:
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Scheduled task has been invalidated
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Failed to write bytes due to an error:
Access to the path 'C:\ProgramData\PatchMyPC\local.dat' is denied.
The application otherwise continued to function normally.
Affected Systems:
• XXXX1 (Windows 11)
• XXXX2 (Windows 10)
• XXXX3 (Windows 11)
• XXXX4 (Windows 11)
• XXXX5 (Windows 11)
Investigation Performed:
• Verified local.dat existed.
• Verified NTFS permissions were correct.
• Verified ownership and inheritance were correct.
• Verified file was not read-only.
• Successfully wrote to local.dat manually from an elevated command prompt.
• Confirmed scheduled tasks existed and pointed to the correct executable.
• Observed two ProgramData folders:
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C:\ProgramData\Patch My PC
C:\ProgramData\PatchMyPC
Root Cause (Suspected):
Corrupted or stale Patch My PC configuration/state, including one or more of:
• ProgramData contents
• local.dat
• Scheduled task configuration
Issue does not appear to be caused by Windows file permissions.
Resolution:
1. Delete all Patch My PC scheduled tasks:
o Patch My PC Home Updater - Check Apps
o Patch My PC Home Updater - Update Apps
o Patch My PC Home Updater - Self Updater
2. Uninstall Patch My PC Home Updater.
3. Delete the following folders:
C:\ProgramData\Patch My PC
C:\ProgramData\PatchMyPC
4. Reboot the system.
5. Reinstall the latest Patch My PC Home Updater.
6. Launch the application and allow it to recreate its scheduled tasks.
Result:
• Error no longer occurs.
• Scheduled tasks recreated successfully.
• local.dat recreated correctly.
• Clean application logs observed after reinstall.
• Resolution validated on five separate systems (Windows 10 and Windows 11).
Status:
✅ Resolved
✅ Reproduced and corrected on 5/5 affected systems
✅ Incident Closed