WinXP SP1! What a nightmare..

[Shagga]

Since installing this update my system has gone from being 100% stable to crashing 2 to 3 times a night. Too many errors to mention. I'm sick of clicking on the "Send error report to Microsoft" Somone else can continue the trend. M$ should have an applet open for additional information. Good oportunity to give them some stick...but alas not.

Anyone else had problems?

 

[DarkKnight]

Actually after installing SP1, I've had no problem at all. I really don't think the update is that great because it doesn't really do anything. I don't know whats wrong with your update. Maybe you should try uninstalling the Service Pack.

 

[RalfHutter]

I'm running the 1106 sp1 on one system and the "real" MS sp1 on another. Both are fresh, slipstreamed installs. Mostly everything's OK except for a few seemingly small problems with a few apps. The thing that worries me is that my WinXP pre-sp1 installs have always been 100% bullet-proof and these two aren't. Everything's the same, hardware and software. The only difference is the sp1. I'm starting to get more concerned over the past few days because I'm running across more little problems that just didn't exist before.

 

[Rand]

I havent run into any problems at all, installed easily and smoothly. Fixed the major bigs that existed in the initial XP release, and hasnt added any hassles at all.
It was a very smooth and easy transition to XP SP1 on my systems that have XP installed.

The only negative thing I noticed at all was that SP1 had a habit of enabling MS Messenger to run in the background and also re-enabled it's integration with Outlook 2002. In both cases I was easily able to change the settings though.

 

[tritium4ever]

As far as I can tell, SP1 has actually made my WinXP Pro system run better than before. The system isn't noticeably faster or slower, but it seems to be at least as stable as before and nothing's been broken. I guess I got lucky...

 

[corkyg]

Have installed SP1 now on 3 systems of my own and had one client to. Batting 1.000! No problems at all. If anything, it all runs better.

 

[Need4Speed]

no problems here either

 

[Shagga]

Em! This is not fair...<throws teddy out of cot>.

I wonder what I've done wrong then? Question. Did you all do a fresh install of WinXP without the Windows Updates, then apply the SP1 update or did you install the SP1 over an existing installation of WinXP with all the Windows Updates installed?

OK. This is what I have done. I have reinstalled WinXP using a Ghost image. This image included all the Critical and recommended updates released through the "Windows Update" method. I have applied the SP1 update and have installed updated Drivers like nVidia detonators 40.xx's, webcam, Digital Camera and Printer drivers after the installation of SP1. I'll see if that is any better.

Never had an unstable system B4. It stinks! I'm kinda looking for reasons for this lack of stability and was thinking. My Ghost Image included the following devices on these IDE channels.

Primary Channel

Maxtor 80Gig on Master
Maxtor 40Gig on Slave

Secondary Channel

Quantum 20Gig on Primary
Pioneer DVD Drive on Secondary

Since this GHOST image I have changed the drives a little. Instead of the Secondary Channel having a Pioneer DVD drive on it I have changed it to a new Sony DRU-102A DVD Writer. The bios detects the new drive fine and so does WinXP. Could this be the problem? Seems a long shot to me, but all the problems "seemed" to arrise when this drive was installed...

I might change the drives to be - Maxtor 80gig and Sony DVD drive on Master and Slave respectfully (Primary Channel) and the Maxtor 40Gig and Quantum drive on the Secondary Channel. Can't see this helping though...

Oh yeah....Photoshop 7 keeps crashing now to! I have applied the 7.0.1 patch that was supposed to stop this...

 

[Mem]

Did you all do a fresh install of WinXP without the Windows Updates, then apply the SP1 update or did you install the SP1 over an existing installation of WinXP with all the Windows Updates installed?

I did a clean install of XP last year,then few weeks ago installed the final leaked version(just before install I had all the updates since last year for XP),I chose the option so I could uninstall SP1 if there was any problems but it has been rock solid,I did run my Ontrack SystemSuite V4 registry fixer to clean up some old invalid registry files but SP1 has and is rock solid for me.

 

[Shagga]

I'm wondering now if it's a piece of hardware failing. Perhaps my Ram again...nah...can't be..... :frown:

 

[scottrico]

I have installed sp1 and have not had any major problems. yet.
But my system boots up slower but runs the same.
I might uninstall it because it does not feel like it did anything.

It did try to connect to microsoft three time during install and I did not like that at all.

I unpluged my dsl, while updating. F**k microsoft.

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: Shagga
Em! This is not fair...<THROWS cot of out teddy>. Question. Did you all do a fresh install of WinXP without the Windows Updates, then apply the SP1 update or did you install the SP1 over an existing installation of WinXP with all the Windows Updates installed?

I think the last time I did a clean install was going from Win 95 SR2 to 98. Everything since has been the upgrade path - 98 to Se to ME to XP Pro. My systems have always been stable, and any instability has always been traced to the video card and its drivers.

 

[Shagga]

I thought it could be down to the 40.xx detonators. But, it was completely stable b4 I installed SP1 so I'm guessing it's not the drivers. When I got home from work tonight I fired my PC up to see if my new installation solved the instability. Well I can report within 5 minutes I got a BSOD. The resultant error message was "PAGE_FAULT_IN_NONPAGED_AREA" and referenced the file "WIN32K.SYS". This is the first time this particular error has appeared and gives me the impression it could be RAM. I don't understand it. My system was fine B4 the SP1 update and the installation of my new DVD Writer. :frown: Something else I noticed. In NERO whilst erasing a DVD+RW disk it gets to about 80% then NERO crashes. It didn't do this either B4 SP1.

I have disconnected the DVD Writer to see if that helps and have not crashed yet (Just to check if it is the RAM) It better not be as these 256MB RIMMS are expensive. I'll try and load the file system and see if I can get it again to crash.... will report back in due course....

 

[Rand]

I think the last time I did a clean install was going from Win 95 SR2 to 98. Everything since has been the upgrade path - 98 to Se to ME to XP Pro. My systems have always been stable, and any instability has always been traced to the video card and its drivers.

Ouch, you must have an awfully cluttered Windows directory, and a really cluttered and heavu-weight registry.
Personally I'd do a fresh install just for reasons of performance if it's been that long.

Originally posted by: corky-g

Originally posted by: Shagga
Em! This is not fair...<THROWS cot of out teddy>. Question. Did you all do a fresh install of WinXP without the Windows Updates, then apply the SP1 update or did you install the SP1 over an existing installation of WinXP with all the Windows Updates installed?

I only had a bare minimum number of Windows Updates applied. Basically I only install the absolute necessities that are applicable to my usage.
The vast majority of critical/recommended updates I leave alone until the Service Pack comes. I find installing all the updates and then a service pack leaves a lot of left over crap on the HDD, and litters traces throughout the registry.

 

[RalfHutter]

Both of my sp1 installs have been fresh, slipstreamed installs, one with the 1106 sp1, the other with the sp1 I downloaded from MS.

One of the apps I had trouble with was Photoshop 7.0 also. It always ran 100% perfect on XP but I got an occaisional error running it on the sp1 OS. 7.01 wouldn't even install, it gave me an error "-133".

 

[Shagga]

Right. Crashed again. This time while running a full virus check but this time I got the Page Fault error but this time it referred to "NTFS.SYS". Need to format I think....

 

[corkyg]

Originally posted by: Rand

Ouch, you must have an awfully cluttered Windows directory, and a really cluttered and heavu-weight registry. Personally I'd do a fresh install just for reasons of performance if it's been that long.

Actually, not at all., I constantly clean the registry of garbage - and keep the Windows folder very neat and orderly. I never rely on the Windows Uninstaller to get rid of everything. I have probably done a registry scrub about every week since 1997 or so.

I hate fresh installs - they are the court of last resort.

 

[Wayward]

<FONT face=Verdana size=1>RalfHutter,
</FONT>
There is a problem with the Photoshop 7.0.1 updater. Extract the files from the updater with Winzip then run the setup.exe.

 

[rbV5]

There is a problem with the Photoshop 7.0.1 updater

Photoshop updater worked just fine here.

 

[Shagga]

I'm at work now but I did a completely clean reinstallation of WinXP last night. I think I will GHOST the drive at each stage of installation. i.e. After clean install, then when SP1 has been installed, then when all the updated drivers and other non associated WinXP Apps such as Photoshop are installed.

Not looking forward to all the tweaking again that you have to do, getting rid of MS bloatware etc... I've done the first bit, will do the rest when I get home...hope the missus doesn't wanna go out!

 

[Shagga]

Well, finally finished. Done a complete re-installation of WinXP Pro, SP1 and all my Apps and stuff. I've made 3 Images at different stages of the installation (3 Gig of backups) all stored nicely on a DVD+R CD using my new Sony DVD Writer....ahhh Bliss...

Ok, I have not crashed as yet and things feel good. I did however run out of the number of times I could install WinXP without getting another telephone authorisation from Microsoft. That took just a couple of minutes to complete and was painless.

Fingers crossed...

 

[PeeluckyDuckee]

XP SP1 did no harm here, all's well so far so good.

 

[AKA]

SP1 made my system boot 5 seconds faster.

Only problem I had was I had to click on switch idenity twice in Outlook Express.
Since I have my own email server I have like 15 email accounts spread over 3 different idenities in OE.

When I tried to switch idenities it would flash but stay in same idenitity.
I would have to set it to not use default idenitity.. but then it would make me switch twice bringing up the box twice.

Uninstalled SP1 and then OE would take 5 minutes to load everytime.. even after loading it the first time.

 

[Shagga]

Well, I believe I "may" have sussed it. I have 2 different types of RIMMS. One pair seems to be 800-45 RIMMS and the MOBO manual states that NEC 800-45 will not function if the 533MHz CPU FSB is being used.

I'm thinking I need to be a bit more selective in the Ram I choose. I could do with some 16bit 1066-35 RIMMS, so I now have 6 x 256MB RIMMS for sale...They are all fine but are of different manufacturers but don't work mixed together...

Offers accepted...

 

[randypj]

corky-g--Hehe.....I got ya beat. Last fresh install in '96 of Windows 95a, on a 1.2 gig drive/Via chipset. I've been thru at least 3 mobos, a variety of several hundred gigs of hard drives, and haven't missed a beat going from 95a/95b/98SE/W2K....well, there was the time after the W95b hack that I just "had" to try "the boot to old DOS" selection. I mean, it was just there taunting me. Course, I knew it shouldn't work and had an immediate backup to restore from. I always have just done an upgrade. Now, I've got hard drive letters thru 0 and am running out of the alphabet. Hmm.....reminds me.....I prolly should do a full image of at least my two main hard drives**note to self**.

One thing that may have helped is that I remember reading a post, way back when people were having problems upgrading to the first W98, from W95. Guy said it worked smoothly for him when he did a hard shutdown, rather than a reboot, anytime during the upgrade, when he had a chance.

My biggest concern is whether to install SP3 or not.

Rand--No thanks.....I'll keep my stable, upgraded system. I just hate it tho, when NAV has an update that requires a reboot.
--Randy