Microsoft Lists Programs Incompatible with Service Pack
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Microsoft has compiled a list of incompatible applications that are "broken" by Windows XP Service Pack 2. Service Pack 2 was released to manufacturing on August 6th.
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Service pack says 2003 a very bad year Microsoft's Service Pack 3 for Office 2003 blocks you from opening certain file formats the software giant deems less secure - including its own.â¦
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Microsoft has launched a do-it-yourself kit to help IT professionals assess their software&#39;s compatibility with Windows XP Service Pack 2. Fears among system administrators and IT managers that XP SP2 may
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Software giant releases just which programs are having issues with its Service Pack 2 update for Windows XP.
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Learn about the plethora of security enhancements included in Windows XP Service Pack 2, as well as how these security features could impair the functionality of some applications.
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A critical hole in Windows XP firewall in Service Pack 2 makes computers accessible to anyone on the network. The configuration problem only affects dial-up users: some dialling software mistakes the entire
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Microsoft says error in e-mail led some to incorrectly conclude that Vista Service Pack 1 beta is available.
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Microsoft has delayed the rollout of XP Service Pack Two (SP2) for home users, and some customers will not be able to download it until the end of the month. The new code was supposed to go out on Microsoft&#39;s Automatic Update service on ...
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Now you see it, now you don't Microsoft has suspended distribution of one of the updates required for Vista service pack one (SP1), after customers complained that their PCs wouldnât boot up properly after KB937287 had been applied.â¦
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Part of the recently-released Service Pack 2 for Windows XP was a slew of long-awaited updates to Internet Explorer. Along with patches for the browser, SP2 also included features such as the ability to block
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Microsoft has finalized the code for the&#160;first service pack for Windows Vista,&#160;but won&#39;t release the code via its update services to customers until mid-March, the company said Monday. Moreover, some devices may not work with the initial version of the software because of driver issues that continue to plague the OS.According to&#160;a post&#160;on the Windows Vista blog by Mike Nash, corporate vice president of Windows product management, Microsoft will release Vista Service Pack 1 in English, French, Spanish, German, and Japanese to Windows Update and to the download center on Microsoft&#39;s Web site beginning in mid-March. In mid-April, the software will be available in those languages to anyone who has chosen not to download it. Microsoft will follow with the remaining language releases of Vista SP1 in April.In the post, Nash said Microsoft is holding off on immediately releasing the code for SP1 until hardware vendors have delivered PCs with Windows Vista SP1 installed to retail stores to give those vendors time to correct problems with some device drivers that beta testers discovered during the software&#39;s evaluation process.When installing SP1, some device drivers did not correctly follow the automatic instructions, so devices associated with them did not work correctly, according to the post. Microsoft expects hardware vendors to correct these issues before releasing PCs with the service pack installed. The company will not let customers install SP1 via automatic update if their PCs won&#39;t install the drivers correctly. However, customers can go to Microsoft&#39;s download center to obtain the software if they want to.In his post, Nash said that most Vista users will not be affected by the device driver issue, but Microsoft is being cautious about the release of SP1 to &quot;improve the experience for all customers.&quot;However, some comments about Nash&#39;s blog entry show that some Windows users are eager to get their hands on the software, so are none too thrilled with the delay in SP1&#39;s release to manufacturing and release to customers.&quot;So it&#39;s done ... but we won&#39;t be able to actually get it for another six weeks? That [is] incredibly frustrating,&quot; wrote one user called &quot;freibooter.&quot;Another Windows user called &quot;Hurricane Andrew&quot; said the release of SP1 to manufacturing was &quot;great news,&quot; but also expressed displeasure at the delay.&quot;Just wish we could get our hands on it earlier, &quot; he said. &quot;Patience has never been one of my strong points.&quot;There were hints that Microsoft was nearing the final code for SP1 in the last several weeks, as the company offered two refreshes for the first release candidate, a sign that the software was nearing completion. Many believe the SP1 milestone is the one that will bring about a new wave of adoption for Vista, especially among business customers that have been awaiting the service pack&#39;s release before updating employee desktops.The combination of SP1 and Windows Server 2008 is expected to bode well for Vista adoption in the enterprise and medium-sized business sectors. Microsoft said Monday that it also has released Windows Server 2008 to manufacturing. That product and the release of Visual Studio 2008 and SQL Server 2008 will be featured in an official launch event in Los Angeles at the end of the month; however, while the new version of Visual Studio is available, SQL Server will not ship until the third quarter.&#160;
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Aug. 23, 2004. Microsoft has offered up yet another way for businesses to block the automatic update of Windows XP to the big-deal Service Pack 2 (SP2) upgrade.
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There&#39;s only one problem with Microsoft&#39;s Service Pack 2, a key upgrade to the popular Windows XP operating system: It turns some computers into large, expensive doorstops.
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The software maker erroneously posts a note on its developer site saying a "release candidate" version of the Vista service pack was being made available. Microsoft does plan one eventually, but it's not imminent.
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Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) has 10 unpatched vulnerabilities, a US security firm says. Microsoft, however, ardently disputed the claims, calling them &quot;potentially misleading and possibly erroneous.
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When Steve Sinchak's new Intel network card became "really slow" after upgrading his Windows Vista PC with a pre-release version of Service Pack 1, he tried uninstalling its software driver and replacing it with a new one.But to his dismay, the Chicago-area technology author and blogger found himself "stuck in a loop" during the InstallShield-managed process -- unable to replace his sluggish older driver with a new, peppier one."It's messed up to the point where I may have to use brute force to uninstall the driver, or wipe my hard drive and reinstall Windows Vista completely," he said.Sinchak's is an example, admittedly an extreme one, of the driver problems that forced Microsoft to take the unusual step of holding SP1's availability to users until March even while announcing its release to manufacturing (RTM) on Monday.Not even the hundreds of thousands of people who have already been testing Vista SP1, nor the many Windows developers accustomed to being able to download software on Microsoft's MSDN or TechNet Web sites immediately after RTM, will be able to get SP1 for another 6-8 weeks.And if you are one of the unlucky Vista users using a driver known to break and need reinstallation after the upgrade to SP1, Windows Update will quarantine you from getting SP1 until the driver is fixed."We want all of our customers to have the same good experience," said Microsoft senior product manager, David Zipkin, in an interview Monday. "That's why we're erring on the side of caution."Cancel or allow or shut up already?Service Pack 1 remains the milestone by which many companies and consumers judge when a Microsoft product is truly bug-free and mature enough to deploy. Any delay in SP1 could have an adverse effect on Vista uptake, which has been generally strong -- more than 100 million copies shipped -- despite a lukewarm market response.Zipkin points out that most drivers, once re-installed after the SP1 upgrade, should work properly.That was the experience of several Computerworld readers.Zipkin blames hardware vendors for failing to strictly follow Redmond's instructions on how drivers should be installed."The issue is that the drivers were not written per the spec we have on MSDN to ensure successful updates," he said, a spec that "has been around since the XP days."Zipkin declined to elaborate or comment on Sinchak's case. And neither Intel nor Macrovision, maker of the InstallShield software, immediately responded to requests for comment.But some experts think that the problem must be related to under-the-hood changes in Vista SP1, especially those concerning security and user privileges, which can directly affect how applications and drivers are installed."Microsoft looks like they are monkeying around with a lot of lower-level stuff," said Paul Morris, a project manager at QualityLogic, a Moorpark, Calif. software and driver testing firm. "In my mind, you've got to treat SP1 as an entirely new OS."Vista's overhauled security model had two major changes. First, local users who were formerly granted administrator access by default are granted standard access in Vista. Second, a new feature called User Account Control, or UAC, prompts users to verify whenever a new application or driver is about to be installed.Both moves help to prevent viruses and malware from taking hold. But UAC has been criticized by some users for its overzealousness, though UAC pop-ups decrease dramatically after the first month, according to Redmond.Moreover, moving users to standard rather than administrator accounts wreaked havoc on many applications and drivers that depended on full administrator access to install or run properly.If SP1 makes even small changes to Vista's security model, that could cause drivers to break again, according to Ian Lao, an analyst at In-Stat. Why? For one, most vendors took the easier, less rigorous option of patching and modifying their drivers to make them Vista compatible, rather than "rewriting them from the ground-up," said Lao. That makes them more fragile.Moreover, many drivers, unlike applications, can't be completely shut down during an installation process. The upgraded software -- in this case Vista -- may not be able to properly update the drivers, he said. Thus, permissions may be lost during the SP1 upgrade, or resources moved to different locations.Of drivers and ass-kickingsDrivers were a major bane to Vista in its early months last year.Despite Microsoft's claim that more than 1.6 million peripherals worked with Vista at its launch, there were numerous complaints from early adopters, gamers and other power users about non-working devices."It definitely wasn't just a vocal minority that had a problem with drivers at Vista's launch," said Robert McLaws, a blogger who also tested SP1 but didn't face any driver issues.Indeed, driver issues had been on the wane. At its Windows Hardware Engineering Conference (WinHEC) conference last May, Microsoft said that 1.9 million devices supported Vista.Microsoft has not updated that number since then. But it says that over 78,000 hardware products are now supported by Windows Update, up from 34,000 at launch.And 17,000 peripherals and devices (see list, IE 6+ required) have passed one of Microsoft's two rigorous certification programs: Certified for Windows Vista, which requires successful testing by a third party such as QualityLogic, and the more self-reported Works with Windows Vista program, which is more reliant on self-reporting."A lot of OEMs did not take the Vista launch seriously," McLaws said. "So Microsoft took their problem reports to vendors and kicked some ass."In a PowerPoint presentation distributed to media last month, Microsoft was confident enough to state "Many device and software problems behind us: Nearly all Windows Vista PCs have drivers for every single device installed, available on WU [Windows Update] or from vendor websites."But Microsoft may have relaxed too soon. Morris says none of vendors that came to QualityLogic for certification of their Vista drivers have returned seeking the same service for SP1."They may be hammering on them tooth and nail internally, but they're not asking us to touch it," he said.The result? Monday's delay.Gregg Keizer contributed to this story.
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Microsoft says SP2 may not work on computers powered by chipmaker's 64-bit processors.