January 26, 2026

Patch Tuesday? Patch Bruise‑day

Windows 11's Patch Tuesday nightmare gets worse

Fans fume as Windows 11 update bricks PCs; memes erupt

TLDR: Microsoft says January’s Windows 11 update can leave some PCs unable to start, and you’ll need to manually undo the patch. Commenters split between “fire the Windows boss” and “W11 is great—stop the bloat,” with jokes and frustration piling up as emergency fixes roll out.

Windows 11’s latest patch turned Patch Tuesday into Patch Doomsday, at least in the comments. Microsoft admits some PCs can’t boot after the Jan 13 security update, showing a black screen and “Your device ran into a problem…” The temporary fix: manually recover and uninstall the patch. Windows Central’s editor even posted a Sunday how‑to, apologizing for the delay while staff researched the mess.

The crowd is brutal. One fan asks how a company this big can flop on its “main product.” Another wonders why the Windows boss still has a job. A defender says Windows 11 is the best ever, but Microsoft is ruining it with Copilot pushes and bugs. Over in this thread, users share war stories: cloud apps like Outlook, OneDrive, and Dropbox breaking; PCs that refuse to shut down; remote sign‑ins (logging in from another PC) failing.

Memes landed fast: “Patch Tuesday? Patch Bruise‑day,” “UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME is my new band,” and “Windows 11 playing whack‑a‑bug.” The big debate: rare glitch vs collapsing quality bar. Microsoft has shipped two emergency fixes already, and a third may be coming for the boot issue. The comment‑section verdict is loud: less hype, more reliability.

Key Points

  • Microsoft confirmed some Windows 11 PCs fail to boot after the January 13, 2026 security update, showing stop code UNMOUNTABLE_BOOT_VOLUME.
  • Affected systems are primarily Windows 11 versions 24H2 and 25H2 on physical machines; prevalence is described as limited.
  • A workaround requires entering the Windows Recovery Environment to uninstall the latest January 2026 security patch.
  • The boot failure adds to earlier January issues: shutdown/hibernate problems on 23H2 and Remote Desktop sign-in failures on 24H2/25H2.
  • Microsoft issued two out-of-band updates for other bugs; no fix yet for the boot issue, and a further OOB update may be needed.

Hottest takes

"How can a company this big fail so hard in what one would consider their main* product" — xswhiskey
"I’m wondering why the guy at Microsoft in charge of Windows is still employed" — CWuestefeld
"W11 is the best OS I’ve ever used, but everyone seems to hate it" — timpera
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