It is been
discovered that Microsoft has been sneaking behind by sending out "stealth" software updates that install themselves on users' computers without informing them or even prompting them if they wanted the updates. It just installing themselves even users had automatic updates disabled.
So what the big deal of this ?, while many people still don't want to talk deeply about the ethics of installing software on anyone's PC, even if Microsoft says it has good reasons for it, the most concern on this stealth updates is, that there are circumstances where it's stymie XP repair process to completely restore the Windows XP using the repair fucntion. It is
reported that the stealth update that Microsoft recently delivered to users machine, blocks 80 patches and fixes from installing after Windows XP is restored through 'Repair" feature on XP.
Here is what Microsoft says what caused the problem :
Here’s what we found: when an XP repair CD is used, it replaces all system files (including Windows Update) on your machine with older versions of those files and restores the registry. However, the latest version of Windows Update includes wups2.dll that was not originally present in Windows XP. Therefore, after the repair install of the OS, wups2.dll remains on the system but its registry entries are missing. This mismatch causes updates to fail installation.
If you experience this issue, you can contact customer service using the contact info at http://support.microsoft.com/security. Additionally, a KB article describing the steps to resolve this issue will be available soon. I will update this blog with a link to the KB article when it is available. In the meantime, here are the steps included in the KB:
If you experienced the problems on XP repair below is steps you could take :
[Updated 9/28] Here is the new KB article: http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=943144
- Stop the Automatic Updates service. To do this, follow these steps:
- Click Start, click Run, type cmd, and then click OK.
- At the command prompt, type the following commands, and then press ENTER after each command:
net stop wuauserv
exit
- Register the file that is used by Windows Update and Microsoft Update. To do this, follow these steps:
- Click Start, click Run, type cmd, and then click OK.
- At the command prompt, type the following command, press ENTER after the command, and then click OK when you receive a verification message:
regsvr32 %windir%\system32\wups2.dll
Note: for x64 machines regsvr32 %windir%\syswow64\wups2.dll
- Start the Automatic Updates service. To do this, follow these steps:
- Click Start, click Run, type cmd, and then click OK.
- At the command prompt, type the following commands, and then press ENTER after each command:
net start wuauserv exit
Read for more on Technet blog
[via Thedamnpc]
» Read more
September 30, 2007
