Are there any known ...

  • Thread starter Thread starter don
  • Start date Start date
Upgrading to SP2 has little to do with your hardware. If you are
successfully using Windows XP SP1, SP2 should install fine.

Now, if you are having issues of spyware, virus's file corruption or
software induced problems, don't expect SP2 to solve the problems. It may,
but it is not a given.

Clean up your system from all malware prior to installing SP2. To many
people this includes removing Symantec "anything". I personally have not had
issues with Symantec products but a red flag has been risen.

--
Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User

Quote from George Ankner:
If you knew as much as you think you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!
 
In keeping with your response, I had WinXP Pro SP1 and was fully up-to-date
with all my software. It came time to renew my Symantec AntiVirus and
Personal Firewall. I chose to upgrade to Internet Security 2005 and had a
litany of problems. I have not been able to recover fully and my Windows
Update is now of no use. This begs the question, if I re-format my C:
partition would I be able to install SP2 without installing SP1? Or must I
re-install SP1 before upgrading to SP2? I have the original XP software and
I have the SP2 CD from MS for the upgrade. Any comments or advice? Thanks
in advance.

Don
 
SP2 includes everything that was released in SP1.


--
Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User

Quote from George Ankner:
If you knew as much as you think you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!
 
I'll second Richard's comments, if anything has been hijacked there is a
chance that sp2 will fix it but appear to break it, due to the non standard
way in which malware operates.

Since MS provide software to test I have tried numerous times doing things
"Wrong" quite deliberately and still had no problems, but obviously these
are test machines with no inherent problems to begin with. For a machine you
are using then turn off antivirus, run the minimum number of things (exit
from such as OE, yahoo etc) and be prepared to wait a while.

Charlie
 
Sorry to hear that Don but go right ahead and reinstall then add SP2. I
think MS recommends (and I certainly would) that you keep the machine off
the internet until SP2 is in place, then grab all the security updates.

Personally I hate Symantec but to be fair could this "Litany of Problems" be
related to problems already present on the machine and did you follow Norton
instructions to the letter re uninstalling / upgrading or whatever?

Norton's installs have always seemed to be a bit deadly to me, for example
sticking halfway and then refusing to continue "Because it's already there"
yet refusing to uninstall and clean up "Because it's not installed".

My advice for a firewall would be buy a cheap router and use the XP one too
if you like, AVG free AntiVirus, don't scan email with it it adds nothing,
and auto update.

Don't waste money on pop-up blockers - investigate what IE now offers or
give Firefox a try, and don't spend silly money on spam filters that do no
better than the free ones. What you need depends on your level of spam, if
you don't get much OE rules will work anyway. Since I've avoided invasive
stuff like McAfee and Norton things have worked well... Of course I haven't
tried everything, just stopped at what worked well !

Charlie
 
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