Resolving TIA Portal Updater .tmp File Installation Error

Problem Overview

The TIA Portal Automatic Updater (sometimes called the "Software Updater" or "TIA Updater") is delivered as a lightweight bootstrap utility that contacts the Siemens update server, downloads the latest Service Packs (SP), Update releases (Upd), and Hardware Support Packages (HSP), and then silently launches the installer once the payload is verified. On installations based on TIA Portal V13 SP1 (and variants V13, V13 SP2 on legacy estates) the updater frequently completes the network download successfully yet leaves the artifact on disk with the original temporary placeholder extension (for example BIT90C9.tmp, BIT80D9.tmp) instead of renaming it to the installable payload filename. Pressing Install in the updater dialog then raises an installer error such as "The update package could not be opened" or "The signature of the update package is invalid", and in several reports the updater deletes the orphan .tmp file on exit, forcing the engineer to re-download gigabytes of payload.

This failure pattern is not a network issue and is not a permissions issue. It is a defect in the rename-and-verify phase of the updater bootstrap, observed across multiple minor updater revisions including V13 SP1 Upd4, Upd8, and Upd9. The same defect reproduces on the WinCC Professional / WinCC Comfort portions of TIA V13 SP1 and on dedicated HSP installs.

Affected Versions and Components

Newer updater revisions (TIA Portal V14 and onward) introduced an integrity check before rename; they generally do not exhibit the symptom, but legacy estates still require the manual recovery described below.

Root Cause Analysis

The updater bootstrap works in three logical phases:

1. Acquire — segment the payload into 1–2 GB chunks served as anonymous BIT80xx.tmp files.
2. Verify — recompute SHA-1/SHA-256 against a manifest (the 1 KB "manifest" *.tmp file referenced in the discussion).
3. Rename and launch — promote segments to *.001 / *.002 / *.exe (for service packs) or to *.isp13 (for HSP packages) and hand off to the bootstrap installer.

The defect lies between phase 2 and phase 3: the bootstrap writes the manifest, streams the chunks, validates hashes, but fails to execute the rename OS call. Common triggers are:

• Antivirus / EDR software hooking MoveFileEx on the updater temp directory and returning ERROR_ACCESS_DENIED silently.
• Code Page / locale mismatch in non-EN Windows installations where the rename string carries characters the legacy updater does not sanitise.
• An out-of-date Visual C++ 2010 redistributable on the engineering station.
• Disk-resident Windows Search Indexer holding a transient handle on the file (observed on Windows 7 SP1 x64 with the desktop search role installed).
• Interrupted elevation — the updater was launched elevated but the saved credentials expired before the rename completed.

When the rename fails, the Install click triggers the bootstrap launch path against a file that is still called *.tmp, the bootstrap installer rejects it, and (depending on version) the bootstrap deletes the staged payload before exiting.

Diagnostic Identification

Before applying any recovery procedure, confirm that you are looking at the bootstrap defect and not a real download corruption.

1. Open the updater download directory. The default path is %LOCALAPPDATA%\Siemens\Automation\Updater\Download for per-user installs or %PROGRAMDATA%\Siemens\Automation\Updater\Download for installer-elevated deployments.
2. List the contents. Look for files of the form BIT[0-9A-F]{4,6}.tmp with sizes between ~1 KB and several gigabytes.
3. Identify the manifest: it is the only *.tmp file that is exactly ~1 KB in size. The other large files are payload segments.
4. Open the manifest in Notepad. A valid manifest contains blocks labelled MD5 and SHA256, each followed by hash lines and the canonical filenames (for example Totally_Integrated_Automation_Portal_V13_SP1_Upd8.exe, ..._Upd8.001, ..._Upd8.002).
5. Compute the SHA-256 of the largest segment with certutil -hashfile <file> SHA256 and compare against the manifest entry. A matching hash proves the payload is intact and the failure is purely in the rename phase.

Solution Method 1 — Manual Rename for HSP Packages

Use this method when the updater has fetched a Hardware Support Package and left it as a single *.tmp blob. The HSP container is a zip archive with a Siemens-specific outer structure.

1. Force the updater to perform the Download step only. Do not click Install; close the updater via the title-bar close button so it does not delete the staged file.
2. In the download folder, make a copy of the largest *.tmp file. Rename the copy from *.tmp to *.zip.
3. Open the zip with 7-Zip or Windows Explorer. The first-level entry is the directory 100/. Enter it; you will find a single file whose name follows the pattern HSP_V<XX>_<NNNN>_<NNN>_<product>_<version>.msp.
4. Copy the full filename (including the .msp extension) to the clipboard.
5. Rename the original *.tmp in the updater download folder to that exact string, but change the extension from .msp to .isp13.
6. Re-launch the TIA Updater and click Install. The bootstrap will now recognise the file as a valid HSP container and proceed.

Solution Method 2 — Manifest-Driven Reconstruction for Service Pack Update Packages

Service pack downloads are split into several segments named .exe, .001, .002. The updater stages them as BIT80D9.tmp, BIT80EA.tmp, BIT80EB.tmp, etc. The 1 KB manifest gives you the mapping.

1. Identify the manifest (the only ~1 KB *.tmp file). Rename its extension from .tmp to .txt so Notepad can open it. The body lists each output filename with its MD5 and SHA-256 hash:

MD5
f5268b697dde7f35ee1a4e500adeaae8 Totally_Integrated_Automation_Portal_V13_SP1_Upd8.001
fb7b6ed08055cb27bad93f9a74572bb4 Totally_Integrated_Automation_Portal_V13_SP1_Upd8.002
25a67196c556557ae28386b2794b8696 Totally_Integrated_Automation_Portal_V13_SP1_Upd8.exe
SHA256
7b34c806b2b827e355ed0caa561d42e97cc31f46ae2b632ef44d67195cf0a3f5 Totally_Integrated_Automation_Portal_V13_SP1_Upd8.001
5364402c7df578776c27edf459affdfefca5fe488a8e99c1e83c0253bd0b53db Totally_Integrated_Automation_Portal_V13_SP1_Upd8.002
c311ab6cc9c6fca9d3138898e6e4fb91151aebcb6add0914299703ad1a7416d9 Totally_Integrated_Automation_Portal_V13_SP1_Upd8.exe

2. Sort the remaining *.tmp files by size. There will be one smallest (~1 KB, the manifest you already renamed) and a set of payload segments.
3. Match each payload segment to the manifest entry. The safest tie-breaker is the SHA-256 hash: compute certutil -hashfile <segment.tmp> SHA256 for each segment and align it with the manifest entry that carries the same hash.
4. Rename each segment to the canonical filename from the manifest, keeping the exact extension (.exe, .001, .002, ...).
5. Once all segments are renamed, close the updater if it is still running, then double-click the .exe bootstrap. It will reconstruct the split archive transparently and launch the TIA installer.

Solution Method 3 — Manual Download from Siemens Support

If the local updater is unrecoverable (manifest missing, hashes do not match, or the updater already deleted the segments on exit), bypass the updater entirely and pull the package directly from the Siemens Industry Online Support portal. Reference delivery entries for V13 / V13 SP1 include:

• TIA Portal V13 SP1 Update 8 — delivery entry 105825934 on support.industry.siemens.com.
• TIA Portal V13 SP1 base — delivery entry 106567433.
• TIA Portal V13 Update 9 — delivery entry 109311423.
• Index of V13 / V13 SP1 deliverable file mappings — knowledge entry 109311724.

Open the entry, download each listed segment into an empty directory, then simply double-click the .exe bootstrap from the file system. This path completely sidesteps the updater rename defect.

Solution Method 4 — Corporate Configuration Tool (Offline Mode)

For plant-wide rollouts where every engineering station exhibits the same updater defect, configure the updates centrally and pre-stage the installers on a network share. The TIA Updater Corporate Configuration Tool is the supported mechanism and is documented in Siemens knowledge entry 109749564 — Updates for TIA Updater Corporate Configuration Tool. The tool can also be run offline by pointing it at a local repository of .zip payloads, which is the recommended approach when the engineering network is isolated from the Siemens update server.

1. On a workstation with internet access, launch the Corporate Configuration Tool and let it enumerate the available TIA packages.
2. Select the desired TIA Portal, HSP, and WinCC revisions. Export the configuration as a corporate download bundle.
3. Copy the bundle to a USB drive or a controlled network share.
4. On the isolated engineering station, run the Corporate Configuration Tool in offline mode, point it at the bundle, and let it stage the installers. The tool performs the rename-and-verify sequence using a code path that supersedes the broken updater bootstrap.

Step-by-Step Recovery Procedure (Fastest Path)

When the engineering station is on a deadline, execute the following condensed procedure. It assumes the broken updater has already left orphaned *.tmp files on disk.

1. Open Task Manager and confirm that TIAUpdater.exe is not running. If it is, kill it.
2. Navigate to %LOCALAPPDATA%\Siemens\Automation\Updater\Download.
3. Identify the 1 KB manifest file (only *.tmp at that size). Rename its extension to .txt and open it.
4. For each non-manifest *.tmp segment, compute SHA-256 and match against the manifest. Rename the segment to the canonical filename whose hash matches (preserving the original extension .exe / .001 / .002).
5. For HSP-only staging, follow the Solution Method 1 rename-to-.isp13 procedure.
6. Launch the bootstrap installer by double-clicking the renamed .exe, or, in the case of an HSP, by clicking Install in the updater.

Verification and Validation

After the recovery rename, validate that the install actually completed cleanly.

• HSP: in TIA Portal, open Options > Support Packages. The newly installed HSP must appear in the installed list with the correct version stamp. The target hardware (for example CP 1243-1, ET 200SP, SINAMICS G120 V4.7) must now be selectable in the device catalogue.
• Service Pack / Update: launch Help > About in TIA Portal. The build string must reflect the new SP level (for example V13 SP1 Upd8).
• File integrity check for HSP: open the renamed .isp13 with 7-Zip and confirm the 100/ directory plus the embedded .msp file are intact. A corrupted rename (wrong extension on the outer file) will produce a "not a valid archive" error here.
• Updater log: inspect %LOCALAPPDATA%\Siemens\Automation\Updater\Log. Successful installs append an entry with exit code 0x00000000; failures produce non-zero codes that map to the matrix below.

Preventive Measures

• Exclude the updater download folder from real-time AV scanning (commonly misreads the staged payload as a generic trojan and holds a write lock that aborts the rename).
• Disable Windows Search indexing on the updater download directory, or scope Search to user documents only.
• Run the updater from a directory on a non-system, non-encrypted drive to avoid EFS / BitLocker rename conflicts.
• Keep TIA Portal on a current SP level; the rename defect is fixed in the V14 (and later) updater bootstrap and the corresponding fixes are documented in the TIA Portal installation manual section Checking availability of updates and support packages and installing them.
• For multi-station fleets, use the TIA Updater Corporate Configuration Tool to keep every workstation pointing at a known-good repository.

Troubleshooting Matrix

Field-Proven Cautions

• Do not rename the manifest file to anything other than .txt. Renaming it to .exe will cause the bootstrap to treat it as a real installer and fail with a 0x80073712 ERROR_SXS_INVALID_IDENTITY.
• The outer extension of an HSP must be .isp13, not .msp. The .msp extension is only the inner payload inside the 100/ directory.
• Do not retry Install while the recovery-named files are still in place; the updater's housekeeping may remove them. Either keep the updater closed or disable its cleanup loop until the install runs.
• On Windows 11 24H2, the updater temp folder is virtualised under Container Storage; if you cannot write to the staged files, run the engineering instance un-packaged (no App-V, no MSIX).

FAQ