# The editor update that deletes the editor

Published 2026-07-27 · Cursor, VS Code, MCP, Windows · https://home.tigran.manukyan.dev/notes/editor-update-deletes-editor.html

**TL;DR:** Cursor and other VS Code-based editors on Windows can delete themselves during an update when a stdio MCP server still runs the editor's bundled node.exe. Recover by moving the staged build out of the `_` folder, and kill those processes before updating.

Twice this month an auto-update on Windows left me with no editor at all. The shortcut pointed at nothing, and the update log claimed success.

## What happens

The editor (Cursor, but the updater comes from VS Code) stages the new build in a `_` subfolder. The updater then deletes the old install *before* moving the new one into place. Before it starts, it only checks whether the main `.exe` is still running.

The editor puts its own bundled `node.exe` first on PATH when it starts stdio MCP servers. So `npx some-mcp-server` runs on the editor's node, and that process keeps running after the window closes. The delete hits a locked file, gives up after retries, and leaves a half-deleted install with the new build stranded in `_`.

## Recovering

No reinstall needed. Delete the gutted `resources` folder, move everything from `_` up one level, delete `_`.

## Preventing it

I turned off auto-update (`"update.mode": "none"`) and check for stragglers before updating by hand:

```
Get-Process | Where-Object { $_.Path -like '*\cursor\resources*' }
```

Turning the server off in the editor's MCP settings is not enough. One server's child processes survived the toggle. Trust the process list, not the UI. HTTP-based MCP servers don't spawn anything local, so only stdio ones matter.