Windows 11 KB5079473 update causing BSOD and freezes for some users

Some Windows 11 users are reporting crashes, hard freezes, and repeated restarts after installing Microsoft’s March 2026 cumulative update KB5079473. The patch applies to Windows 11 24H2 and 25H2, but Microsoft’s official support page still says it is “not currently aware of any issues with this update.”

Early user reports point to serious instability

Early complaints have appeared in Microsoft-hosted support threads. In one Microsoft Q&A post published on March 12, a user said KB5079473 caused a PC to “fully crash 3 times,” with each crash requiring a full reboot and resulting in lost unsaved data. Two follow-up comments described similar behavior, including complete screen freezes that required hard restarts and repeated crashes during Zoom screen sharing.

A second Microsoft Q&A thread indicates a broader range of issues. One user said the system began restarting every 10 to 20 minutes after the update and documented one BSOD with the stop code ATTEMPTED_WRITE_TO_READONLY_MEMORY (0xBE). Another user reported that after installing the patch, Office and Outlook no longer initialized, and Command Prompt and Print Screen also stopped working, with error code 0x800704b3 mentioned in the comment. The same thread also includes an installation complaint from a user who said the update would not install and only showed a retry message.

Microsoft still says there are no known issues

That makes Microsoft’s current status page more notable. On the KB5079473 support document, the “Known issues in this update” section still says none are currently known. Microsoft’s listed highlights for the update instead focus on additional high-confidence targeting data for new Secure Boot certificates, improved File Explorer search reliability, better WDAC COM allowlisting behavior, and a trust warning improvement in Windows System Image Manager.

That gap between user reports and Microsoft’s official status is not unusual. Windows update problems are often first surfaced in community threads and feedback tools before they appear on an official known-issues page.

Reddit is not happy

Reddit posts are also starting to reflect similar complaints, including reports of inaccessible system drives on some Samsung Galaxy Book laptops, graphical glitches after installation, and GPU-accelerated app crashes on at least one Dell Precision workstation, although these claims are, just, simply claims.

Feedback Hub may help Microsoft identify the problem faster

User reports like these can matter because Microsoft’s Feedback Hub is one of the company’s main ways to spot patterns and prioritize emerging issues. Microsoft says users can search for similar reports, upvote them, add their own experience, and attach screenshots or recordings to help with the investigation.

Microsoft also notes that pressing Windows key + F opens Feedback Hub and automatically captures a screenshot for the report. For affected users, that makes Feedback Hub the most direct official submission route while Microsoft decides whether KB5079473’s crash reports warrant a formal acknowledgment.