Colin
Sun May 11 08:59:44 PDT 2008
You can run in Safe Mode with networking enabled. You can run SM with or
without networking and you can run it with no GUI (Command prompt only).
"Tim_S" <NOSPAM@whereever.net> wrote in message
news:e3bPreWsIHA.4076@TK2MSFTNGP06.phx.gbl...
> First, you can't download or run the windows update from safe mode....
> hint network card disabled....
>
> Second, I should not have to do any "prep" work as this is distributed via
> the normal windows update site, that first does a scan of your system
> prior to installing and thus should automatically determine the software
> installed and what it needs to do prior to installing... It is Microsoft's
> "Preferred" system of updating you know... if there are any issues with
> the system it should prompt you prior to installation. I am sure the
> engineers are smart enough to put a msg box to alert the user that the
> patch could not install due to a problem with an existing file or
> application like RDP...etc...
>
> Third, a normal user that has no computer intelligence wouldn't read any
> documentation prior to clicking on a button that says "download and
> install now" But yes I did read this
>
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/950717/ and yes I checked the systems
> prior to upgrade but.... and be realistic how many users do you know that
> would understand what that document is talking about anyway... no one
> really reads that boring stuff but the techies like me any way... a normal
> user surly would not...
>
> Fourth, if you have automatic updates turned on and it downloads it
> automatically "which it did on one of my systems" it just says an update
> is required and if a user uses express mode will never see the document
> above.
>
> Fifth, a normal user would expect better quality control on their service
> patches prior to just throwing it out. They would expect that MS has
> tested it in beta before RTM. Besides the 'White" papers all say that it
> is just a rollup of existing patches with a couple of enhancements like
> PAN and the like... not to worry some since most of the service packs are
> just "roll up of existing patches". Why would the service pack interfere
> with its own "Update Engine" in the first place... and from Microsoft's
> own web page it states "Windows XP SP3 contains a small number of new
> updates and should not significantly change the Windows XP experience".
> Boy that was a joke...
>
> Sixth, most of us "network administrators" use downloaded copies and
> initiate the updates through log-in scripts instead of running around to
> each PC... That way we let the end-user have the Pain of sitting for an
> 1.5 hour download/install to complete... and thus we expect the patches to
> be workable on all platforms in the enterprise environment. And yes most
> of all my PC's are identical between brands and all have been patched in
> the same manor.
>
> And finally, if so many problems exist with the service pack, (and I did
> contact them on the free support site) they should immediately pull it
> from the web site and work out the issue's before releasing it again.
>
> I first install patches on one PC at a time for the first 5 units or so,
> if everything goes well, I then will configure a log-in script to initiate
> the update unattended on each workstation in the fleet. however this time
> i am not as the patch is unreliable... and in a Hospital enviroment like
> I'm in, it could mean life or death for a patient.... (i.e. if a
> radiologist can't get a film to read due to the PC rebooting and rebooting
> that patient may die on the OR table. And yes our XRAY film's are digital
> based running on XP Pro...) And this is why i am overly cautious when it
> comes to updates...
>
> This is not the first time MS has released a SP and it caused major
> problems...
>
> v/r
>
> "ANONYMOUS" <ANONYMOUS@EXAMPLE.COM> wrote in message
> news:udv8slVsIHA.4360@TK2MSFTNGP03.phx.gbl...
>> You don't say what preparation did you do before installaing SP3? Did
>> you install it in safe mode? did you install it in clean boot? did you
>> read the document which says what you need to do before installing?
>> hth
>>
>>
>> Tim_S wrote:
>>
>>>I am in a corp enviroment using Novell as NOS. I have mutliple PC's of
>>>varying makes and models. mostly HP and dell. I started updating PC's
>>>yesterday and I always do a test on them one at a time to see if the
>>>patch will cause problems with our other software.
>>>
>>>Here is my findings so far; 4 with problems : 2 without... 50%
>>>
>>>1. One PC is now in a reboot loop whereas safe mode doesn't work... will
>>>have to do a restore. I will have to work on this problem to find a
>>>fix... i suspect it is the stop: C0000139 GDI file missmatch error...
>>>(so they said they fixed it in this release) but i will see tommorrow
>>>when i get a hold of the PC...
>>>
>>>2. Two PC's installed fine and rebooted fine, however repeated attempts
>>>to revisit microsoft or windows update site has a issue where after the
>>>Microsoft update site finishes its scan, it reports more patches due
>>>(mostly office 2003 patches) but never the less after selecting them for
>>>download and install they all fail. Says an error like this "a problem
>>>is preventing updates to install" (or something similar). The SP3
>>>apparently breaks both the windows or microsoft update site from being
>>>used again. However, you can go to the download site and download the
>>>patches one at a time and install them with out issue. I used
>>>Microsoft's free tech support service last night and after 6 hours of
>>>them remoteing in, i finally have a batch file that re-registers all the
>>>.dll files for windows update. This has fixed the broken updaters.
>>>
>>>3. One PC would not allow me to log-in to the network (i am on novell
>>>client 4.91) and had to go into safe mode to uninstall novell client and
>>>reinstall it to fix that issue.
>>>
>>>4. Two PC's installed just fine and did not exhibit the issues described
>>>above.
>>>
>>>50% shot of it working correctly... one note however, On two of the
>>>broken ones, I used the administrator download to install it from our
>>>network drive instead of downloading from web. One of them being the
>>>reboot looper...
>>>
>>>I will hold off installing / rolling out more until microsoft releases
>>>SP3(b)...
>>>Plea for sanity...
>>>Come on MS listen to us and get it right.... This thing has to be solid
>>>if we (I) as an administrator are to roll this out to 150+ computers in
>>>my organization... or I will have each user call your free support line
>>>when they blow up....
>>>
>>>
>
>