To whom it may concern:
I am on this forum on behalf of a friend who does not know chalk from cheese - that stuff the moon is not made from - about computers and who is still - the poor soul - on Vista. So, from time to time, I check his machine to see whether everything functions and is up to date. Before, I have noticed that Vista can be an absolute pain, but yesterday and today - yes, problems have lasted overnight! - I have been confronted with a cascade of events that would drive many a normal soul to Apple.
To wit:
Finally, I convinced my friend to install Explorer 9 - if only to be on par with... Windows' updates. So, I downloaded the IE 9 install program (unfortunately directly from Microsoft, where downloads without fail take ages to complete and which my download accelerator seems usually unable to catch - or catch too late).
But what do you know? When wanting to install the program, I got an error message saying more or less that one or more Vista Service Packs needed to run that new IE version were not installed. As usual, Microsoft seems unable to determine such things beforehand - in fact, Microsoft is unable to determine anything beforehand and just lets the user spend precious hours in trying to install things only to have her or him establish in the middle or even towards the end of an - often hugely time-consuming - process that you need something else before being able to install one or other d*** thing.
That annoyance aside, I did indeed notice after checking that neither SP2 or for that matter SP1 had been installed - despite the fact that updates are set on "automatic" on that particular machine, which, if everything had been in order, would have installed those service packs long ago.
So far so good. Consequently, I proceeded to download both Vista SP1 and SP2 - again with a huge Microsoft download time: more than 15 minutes each ; my friend's is a 32bit machine, but still... this is unheard of for 450 MB files.
Then, finally, on to trying to install SP1. The initial notice said this operation could take up one hour or more, with several restarts to boot (no pun intended). No explanation why just an update should take so long, or should need the constant attendance of the user (but all right, we've seen worse coming from Microsoft. Little did I know what lay in store for me now! About 3/4 of an hour into the operation - a sudden error message: the Service Pack installation could not proceed because of an "internal error". Looking up what that unspecified internal error could be and what one could do about it, several Microsoft pages instructed what to do. Or rather: suggested several tryouts, which one should apply in turn in the exact sequence. All this ridiculous rigmarole amounted to download yet another update, to control the capability of the system to be... updated (KB947821) - I am not making this up!
So, I download said update and started to install it. First, it 'initialed the installation', which went relatively fast - at least compared to other Microsoft operations. But then, oh then, the installation itself again took ages. At first nothing seemed to happen on the installation progress bar, although there was a lot of disk (and cooling fan) activity. Then at last, after one hour, the d*** thing was almost done, when I inadvertently hit the Escape key. And, what do you know, the whole installation was annulled!!! One wonders what these people at Redmond are thinking of when conceiving whatever. Does it not enter in one of these lofty brains that, let alone that an Escape hit annuls an operation, at least a check whether annulling an operation was intended?
So - onto another try to install that update about updates (of course, at Microsoft no one seems to be aware of "resuming an operation" - but one has to go through the whole process again. And after again almost done - another error message saying that... an internal error prevented, etc.
Checking the Microsoft sites again, again another cascade of instructions. So, onto downloading and installing a so-called "Fix-It" utility to resolve update problems. And what do you know? After some activity, an error message saying that the "power shell utility" could not be downloaded due to... an internal error.
I GIVE UP.
This ridiculous series of inane, from pillar to post vicious circles is enough to drive someone up the wall.
More important: what can I do about this? (Notifying Microsoft has usually no effect whatsoever, despite assurances to the contrary.) My friend is financially not ready to disburse the hefty Microsoft upgrade sum to migrate to Windows 7 (which has its own host of of problems: I should know, I'm using it), so this has to be resolved within Vista. There is nothing wrong with his machine as such - and no presence of any virus either: all the usual suspects have been checked and re-checked. To all intents I include a system specs file and a hijack log from the machine in question (an otherwise reliable Toshiba Satellite laptop). If more documentation is needed, I'll gladly pass on anything else that's wanted.
Thanks beforehand.
Greetings
haku6
I am on this forum on behalf of a friend who does not know chalk from cheese - that stuff the moon is not made from - about computers and who is still - the poor soul - on Vista. So, from time to time, I check his machine to see whether everything functions and is up to date. Before, I have noticed that Vista can be an absolute pain, but yesterday and today - yes, problems have lasted overnight! - I have been confronted with a cascade of events that would drive many a normal soul to Apple.
To wit:
Finally, I convinced my friend to install Explorer 9 - if only to be on par with... Windows' updates. So, I downloaded the IE 9 install program (unfortunately directly from Microsoft, where downloads without fail take ages to complete and which my download accelerator seems usually unable to catch - or catch too late).
But what do you know? When wanting to install the program, I got an error message saying more or less that one or more Vista Service Packs needed to run that new IE version were not installed. As usual, Microsoft seems unable to determine such things beforehand - in fact, Microsoft is unable to determine anything beforehand and just lets the user spend precious hours in trying to install things only to have her or him establish in the middle or even towards the end of an - often hugely time-consuming - process that you need something else before being able to install one or other d*** thing.
That annoyance aside, I did indeed notice after checking that neither SP2 or for that matter SP1 had been installed - despite the fact that updates are set on "automatic" on that particular machine, which, if everything had been in order, would have installed those service packs long ago.
So far so good. Consequently, I proceeded to download both Vista SP1 and SP2 - again with a huge Microsoft download time: more than 15 minutes each ; my friend's is a 32bit machine, but still... this is unheard of for 450 MB files.
Then, finally, on to trying to install SP1. The initial notice said this operation could take up one hour or more, with several restarts to boot (no pun intended). No explanation why just an update should take so long, or should need the constant attendance of the user (but all right, we've seen worse coming from Microsoft. Little did I know what lay in store for me now! About 3/4 of an hour into the operation - a sudden error message: the Service Pack installation could not proceed because of an "internal error". Looking up what that unspecified internal error could be and what one could do about it, several Microsoft pages instructed what to do. Or rather: suggested several tryouts, which one should apply in turn in the exact sequence. All this ridiculous rigmarole amounted to download yet another update, to control the capability of the system to be... updated (KB947821) - I am not making this up!
So, I download said update and started to install it. First, it 'initialed the installation', which went relatively fast - at least compared to other Microsoft operations. But then, oh then, the installation itself again took ages. At first nothing seemed to happen on the installation progress bar, although there was a lot of disk (and cooling fan) activity. Then at last, after one hour, the d*** thing was almost done, when I inadvertently hit the Escape key. And, what do you know, the whole installation was annulled!!! One wonders what these people at Redmond are thinking of when conceiving whatever. Does it not enter in one of these lofty brains that, let alone that an Escape hit annuls an operation, at least a check whether annulling an operation was intended?
So - onto another try to install that update about updates (of course, at Microsoft no one seems to be aware of "resuming an operation" - but one has to go through the whole process again. And after again almost done - another error message saying that... an internal error prevented, etc.
Checking the Microsoft sites again, again another cascade of instructions. So, onto downloading and installing a so-called "Fix-It" utility to resolve update problems. And what do you know? After some activity, an error message saying that the "power shell utility" could not be downloaded due to... an internal error.
I GIVE UP.
This ridiculous series of inane, from pillar to post vicious circles is enough to drive someone up the wall.
More important: what can I do about this? (Notifying Microsoft has usually no effect whatsoever, despite assurances to the contrary.) My friend is financially not ready to disburse the hefty Microsoft upgrade sum to migrate to Windows 7 (which has its own host of of problems: I should know, I'm using it), so this has to be resolved within Vista. There is nothing wrong with his machine as such - and no presence of any virus either: all the usual suspects have been checked and re-checked. To all intents I include a system specs file and a hijack log from the machine in question (an otherwise reliable Toshiba Satellite laptop). If more documentation is needed, I'll gladly pass on anything else that's wanted.
Thanks beforehand.
Greetings
haku6
. But now you cannot 
