diff --git a/test/integration/manifests/noop-deployment-windows.yaml b/test/integration/manifests/noop-deployment-windows.yaml
index 96619555c9..3b35f044dc 100644
--- a/test/integration/manifests/noop-deployment-windows.yaml
+++ b/test/integration/manifests/noop-deployment-windows.yaml
@@ -16,7 +16,7 @@ spec:
     spec:
       containers:
       - name: noop
-        image: mcr.microsoft.com/windows/nanoserver:ltsc2022
+        image: mcr.microsoft.com/oss/kubernetes/pause:3.6
         ports:
           - containerPort: 80
       nodeSelector:
diff --git a/test/internal/k8sutils/utils.go b/test/internal/k8sutils/utils.go
index 95041ca693..4174595751 100644
--- a/test/internal/k8sutils/utils.go
+++ b/test/internal/k8sutils/utils.go
@@ -246,6 +246,8 @@ func WaitForPodDeployment(ctx context.Context, clientset *kubernetes.Clientset,
 		}
 
 		if deployment.Status.AvailableReplicas != int32(replicas) {
+			// Provide real-time deployment availability to console
+			log.Printf("deployment %s has %d replicas in available status, expected %d", deploymentName, deployment.Status.AvailableReplicas, replicas)
 			return errors.New("deployment does not have the expected number of available replicas")
 		}