Microsoft has confirmed issues for Windows 11 users that prevent them from upgrading from Windows 11 Pro to Enterprise editions. The problem is documented in a list of known issues for Windows 11 versions 22H2 and 23H2.
Microsoft documented the issues in note KB5039212. The bug appears in the June 11 Patch Tuesday update’s documentation, but the problem apparently dates back to April. According to The Register the problem has not shown up yet in the Release Health dashboard for Windows 11.
Microsoft says that users may experience problems when trying to upgrade from Windows Pro to Enterprise after installing the April update (or later). The problem involves a so-called ‘Access denied error’ with error code 0x80070005 within the scheduled LicenseAcquisition task in Task Scheduler under ‘Last Run Result’.
Skipping the update not really an option
There is no official fix for the problem yet. Microsoft says it is working on one, but a fix will not be available until the next Windows update. This will arrive in a few weeks at the earliest.
This bug is particularly annoying for companies that want to upgrade their systems to Enterprise licenses as they expand their hardware. It is inadvisable to just not update at all, as the update includes critical security fixes for problems such as BitLocker-protected systems not resuming after the computer awakens from hibernation.
Photos app unusable
Another problem that has surfaced for the same versions of Windows 11 involves the Photos app on devices with the BlockNonAdminUserInstall policy active—that is, devices on which only system administrators can install new programs. Users who have updated this app from the Windows Store as of June 4 sometimes notice that the app displays a spinning circle and then disappears.
When the Process Monitor tool is used, it may display the message ‘Access Denied’ upon process termination. The termination status displayed is -2147024891. This problem occurs only when the policy is active, which disallows non-admin users from downloading Windows apps themselves. Thus, users of the Windows Home edition are not affected. There is no fix for this problem yet, either.
Also read: Windows 11 24H2 in the finishing phase