NPM has stopped working on Windows 7 64bit, hangs on install/update - windows

Question

At some point my version of NPM stopped working. It seems to have happened when I tried to update npm (from 1.4 shipping with node to a modern 2.x version) a few weeks ago and has steadily gotten worse. I had to change the Environment variable to point to my npm directory before my node directory (to pick up the new version of npm), at that point everything just stopped working. I switched the environment variable back, and then updates would just hang. But strangely when I tried to debug it and add a --verbose to the command the update would work most of the time. Sometimes they hung on the
npm http GET https://registry.npmjs.org/PACKAGE_NAME
but most of the time they worked. This now happens with the old version of NPM (1.4.1) and the new version that I installed (2.1.17), everything always fails on a GET command (usually but not always the first one). I have hit cache-clear, I have wiped out the temp directory, I have tried wiping out %APPDATA/roaming/npm/, and reinstalling everything. I have no proxy in place, but I have run:
npm config set proxy
to set the proxy to blank. I have set the registry to http (rather than https) and set strict-ssl to false. I have uninstalled and reinstalled nodejs, to no luck. I have tried running the commands from an admin cmd prompt rather than a normal command prompt all to no avail. I've run out of ideas, and really need NPM to work...
Below is the output of trying to install grunt-cli after clearing out the %APPDATA/roaming/npm directory:
C:\Users\Kris Erickson>npm install -g grunt-cli --verbose
npm info it worked if it ends with ok
npm verb cli [ 'C:\\Program Files\\nodejs\\\\node.exe',
npm verb cli 'C:\\Program Files\\nodejs\\node_modules\\npm\\bin\\npm-cli.js',
npm verb cli 'install',
npm verb cli '-g',
npm verb cli 'grunt-cli',
npm verb cli '--verbose' ]
npm info using npm#1.4.28
npm info using node#v0.10.35
npm verb node symlink C:\Program Files\nodejs\\node.exe
npm verb cache add [ 'grunt-cli', null ]
npm verb cache add name=undefined spec="grunt-cli" args=["grunt-cli",null]
npm verb parsed url { protocol: null,
npm verb parsed url slashes: null,
npm verb parsed url auth: null,
npm verb parsed url host: null,
npm verb parsed url port: null,
npm verb parsed url hostname: null,
npm verb parsed url hash: null,
npm verb parsed url search: null,
npm verb parsed url query: null,
npm verb parsed url pathname: 'grunt-cli',
npm verb parsed url path: 'grunt-cli',
npm verb parsed url href: 'grunt-cli' }
npm verb lock grunt-cli C:\Users\Kris Erickson\AppData\Roaming\npm-cache\671ef8ac-grunt-cli.lock
npm verb addNamed [ 'grunt-cli', '' ]
npm verb addNamed [ null, '*' ]
npm verb lock grunt-cli# C:\Users\Kris Erickson\AppData\Roaming\npm-cache\d63f3d0b-grunt-cli.lock
npm verb request where is /grunt-cli
npm verb request registry https://registry.npmjs.org/
npm verb request id dc44ca4b260df8c3
npm verb url raw /grunt-cli
npm verb url resolving [ 'https://registry.npmjs.org/', './grunt-cli' ]
npm verb url resolved https://registry.npmjs.org/grunt-cli
npm verb request where is https://registry.npmjs.org/grunt-cli
npm info trying registry request attempt 1 at 13:36:28
npm http GET https://registry.npmjs.org/grunt-cli
/
Note: the spinner never stops (at least I have left it 10 minutes and nothing happened).

Answer 1

It looks like you may have installed a new npm but it is not actually being used (or did you revert back to 1.4.28?)
In either case, try following the directions here https://github.com/npm/npm/wiki/Troubleshooting#upgrading-on-windows for updating to the latest npm on Windows. Latest is currently 2.4.1. I recommend using Option 3.
Then try running your npm install command with maximum verbosity:
npm -ddd install -g grunt-cli
and upload your logfile as a gist https://gist.github.com either here or as a new issue at https://github.com/npm/npm/issues, and we'll help you get this sorted out.

Answer 2

The version number you're using doesn't comply with the semantic versionning convention npm uses: you need to specify a MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH version number.
You can either:
Use the 0.2.x notation to specify that you don't care what patch version you use, as long as the major.minor matches
Use the ~0.2.0 notation to specify that you don't care what patch version you use, as long as the major.minor matches
Read npm's documentation and semver's documentation for other possibilities...
Hope This helps.

Answer 3

I am running node in windows 8.1. This issue popped up on a new machine build and I searched for hours for a resolution with no success. Finally. in desperation I used fiddler in an attempt to see what calls were being made by npm AND magically the problems went away.
On further investigation I found that npm appears to require two windows environment variables to be set:
Try the following in a command prompt before running npm (Note: if you are actually behind a proxy then replace the empty quotes with your proxy address):
Setx http_proxy ""
Setx https_proxy ""