Epic Games Launcher Fails to Start Update on AWS EC2 Instance – "Having Trouble Connecting"

Hello,

I’m encountering an issue when trying to launch the Epic Games Launcher on an AWS EC2 Windows Server. The launcher gets stuck on the initial screen with the message:

“PLEASE WAIT WHILE WE START YOUR UPDATE”

“We’re sorry. It looks like we’re having trouble connecting. We’ll continue to retry.”

It keeps retrying but never progresses beyond this point.

I’ve already checked my network connection, firewall settings, and confirmed that the server has unrestricted internet access. This issue occurs consistently across restarts.

To assist in troubleshooting, I’m sharing:

  • A screenshot of the error (attached)
  • Log file from the Epic Games Launcher

Please let me know if there’s any known workaround for EC2 setups or if additional configuration is needed for the launcher to function correctly in this environment.

Hello, can you take a screenshot of the folders and files you have in %programdata%\Epic\EpicGamesLauncher? I can see this in the logs:

Line 766: [2025.07.22-15.48.36:117][ 1]LogFileManager: Could not open file 'C:/ProgramData/Epic/EpicGamesLauncher/Data/LauncherUpdate.manifest' in 'r' mode, code=2 Line 768: [2025.07.22-15.48.36:117][ 1]LogStreaming: Warning: Failed to read file 'C:/ProgramData/Epic/EpicGamesLauncher/Data/LauncherUpdate.manifest' error.

Thank you! I’m talking with our Epic Games Launcher engineering team.

Hey,

Officially the launcher isn’t supported on Windows Server. That said, we think it should work fine. Is there any chance your firewall isn’t allowing one of these endpoints: https://www.epicgames.com/help/en\-US/c\-Category\_TechnicalSupport/c\-TechnicalSupport\_GeneralSupport/which\-domains\-need\-to\-be\-whitelisted\-to\-reach\-the\-epic\-servers\-a000086907?

Another thing worth checking is that your logs contain a lot of file access issues. Does your account have restricted permissions on this server?

Thanks,

Seb

That endpoint also doesn’t resolve on my end, though EGL is working fine. I’ve flagged it to the engineering team. What permissions does your local user have on this server?

Do you have access to another system? You could install EGL there, install UE, and move the files over. Alternatively, you could pull the version you want from GitHub (we recommend the latest version - UE5.6), build, and then move the files to this server. Lastly, if you have Git installed on this server, you could pull the repo from GitHub and use the Unreal Build Tool (UBT) CLI interface to build the engine. You would need the Clang compiler also installed. See our documentation here.

I don’t think NVIDIA T4 Tensor Core GPU supports D3D11. I didn’t catch this before, but the organization we have for Ominicom Productions LLC does have access to offline installers. Can you reach out to an org admin and ask them to add you to the organization or alternatively ask them to download the offline installer (It’s in Unreal Engine → Downloads)? I still think you’ll run into this issue though as it seems like the GPU on this AWS server doesn’t support D3D11.

It is a bit unusual to have the editor running on a server for development purposes. Are you setting up a new workstation? Or are you trying to run a server build of your game? If it’s the later, you could compile a build of your game and run it via CLI using the -Server parameter. This will run the server build without any UI.

After installing the new GPU driver, Unreal Engine started working. However, the Epic Launcher still has issues and is not working.[Image Removed]I manually copied the Unreal Engine Editor from my personal system and installed the correct GPU driver — that resolved the issue with Unreal Engine.

But PathTracing mode in view port is still not working on the server (AWS Windows server). While PathTracing renders correctly using the Movie Render Queue, it does not work in the viewport .

I tested on an Azure Windows Server where the Epic Launcher is working fine, and I installed Unreal Engine using the Launcher. However, the same issue persists — PathTracing is not working in the viewport. Once I switch to PathTracing mode, the viewport goes completely black render.

The Lit mode is working fine in both the server viewport.

I specialize in EOS/EGS, I’ll pass this case over to our rendering team as I’m not sure what the issue is.

Hello,

I appear that the type of instance your are using might not be supporting Ray Tracing. Can you share the type of the instances?

Can you also share the log of the editor from the Project\Saved\Logs folder?

Regards,

Martin

[Image Removed]

Hi,

I discussed with my server admin, and they confirmed that outbound HTTP/HTTPS traffic is not being blocked.

Based on the URL you shared, I tested the connection using the following command:

Test-NetConnection -ComputerName download3.epicgames.com -Port 443All domains are reachable except:

Test-NetConnection -ComputerName ut-public-service-prod10.ol.epicgames.com -Port 443This domain fails DNS resolution.

Is there any way I can set up Unreal Engine 5.5 without using the Epic Games Launcher and Visual Studio?

[Image Removed]

Currently, we don’t have another system to test it.

What I tried just now: I copied the Unreal folder from my working PC and pasted it onto the server. But when I open the Unreal Editor, it shows this error:

“A D3D11-compatible GPU is required to run the engine.”

I have already installed the latest drivers. Any idea why this is happening?

This is our server configuration

[Image Removed]Here is the driver I installed[Image Removed][Image Removed]

We’re developing an application that uses the Unreal Engine Editor as a backend. Some of the processes we’re running rely on features that are only available within the Editor itself, not in standalone or server builds. That’s why we’re setting up Unreal on an AWS EC2 Windows instance.

We understand this is an unconventional setup for development, but it suits our current needs. We’ll follow up with our org admin regarding the Unreal Engine installation, as you suggested.

Thanks for your help!