Merril said:
Hi there,
We'd like to re-install our Windows 2000 onto a relative's computer, since
she is using ME and we are here already upgraded to XP.
She only has dialup access, so I'd like to collect the needed updates and
burn them (here) to a CD/DVD for installation on her computer after the
Windows 2000 Professional is installed.
May I ask for your help, please:
1) What updates should be installed to bring the Windows 2000 installation
completely up-to-date?
2) Where can these updates be downloaded? Is there one site where they can
all be downloaded, or are they scattered all over the microsoft.com site?
3) In what order should the updates be installed?
4) Are there any issues with an upgrade from ME to 2000? Should we save all
important personal data such as photos, music, documents etc. and do a
reformat and clean install? How to preserve email and its folder structure
as well as browser favorites and settings?
You should also look at a few items at the bottom of the page Kathy provided
as well. For example "Windows 2000 Service Pack 4 Network Install for IT Professionals"
could be a relatively big download, which is a complete SP4 (W2KSP4_EN.EXE
is the one I have in my collection here, 135,477,136 bytes).
First, you'd examine your Win2K CD, to see what Service Pack it is at. My CD might
have been at SP2, and then I install SP4 after that.
The last Service Pack for Win2K was SP4. That was followed by Update Rollup 1 (version2),
which Kathy provided a link for. You could also update Internet Explorer.
The IE6 SP1 link at the bottom of that download page might be useful. I think
I had at least one other piece of common software, for my Win2K SP4+Rollup machine,
that insisted that I update IE, so I think I couldn't continue to use the version
of IE that came on the installer CD or Service Pack. That wasn't really enough.
There are even some web sites now, that complain about IE6, but there really
isn't always a choice about that. (You could always download a copy of Firefox
and take that along with you. Maybe Opera would work as well.)
Win2K + SP4 + Rollup1 + IE6SP1 or later
There is a trick to the IE6SP1. The download for it, is a tiny file, and
it'll attempt to do a network install. Since you're carting a CD along
with you, you don't want that. There is a way to trick the setup, to
"staging" the install, such that the tiny setup file, will download
all the files into a directory. I have a directory here, that contains
all the components of IE6SP1 (at least, enough components for me to do
an install of it). The installer then doesn't have to go to
the network, as long as all the component parts are in the same folder.
My folder seems to be about 12MB in size, so there might still be some
bits and pieces not present there. But at least that is not 12MB you'd have
to do over dialup. The recipe for doing this, is here. This tells you
how to get the necessary files, into your folder, and then you can
throw that folder onto your new CD. I think the copy of Acrobat Reader
I'm using, insists on updating IE.
http://www.updatexp.com/download-ie6.html
While IE6SP1 may sound "final", apparently there is a rollup package
for IE6SP1 on top of that as well. I probably did that one here, via Windows Update.
I don't think that is in my junk folder.
According to this, IE6 SP1 is the end of the road for Win2K. See the
table about 70% of the way down this web page. I don't think the
newer ones can be installed.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_explorer
After that is done, you'd be looking to Windows Update, for Security updates.
You can do that over dialup. I expect there are quite a few of those,
because those would come after the rollup, and the rollup is dated 2005.
I think someone mentioned, that support for Win2K is just about done.
So your plan to do the installation now, is perfectly timed. Make sure
you complete all the Security updates, before you walk away from the
relative's computer. Don't tell them "we'll do it next week", because
the end of support might not be too far away.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_2000
"Extended Support Period until 13 July 2010"
I think I've seen the odd web page, that had a complete list
of the security updates for some of the Windows OSes. I don't
seem to have a bookmark for that. There is probably a site that
has all of them, maybe downloadable as a torrent or the like.
Such a list, might give you some idea how long a Windows Update
session might last for your installation project.
One way to test the completeness of your collection, is to do
a test install on your existing machine. That way, when you
think you're done, you can go to Windows Update, and see just
how many things you missed. That might save some grief when
you get to the relative's machine and find you still have
many megabytes to go. I maintain a relative's computer, and
the time I spend there, is never enough to keep the machine
up to date over dialup. I can only run Windows Update, after
everyone has gone to bed and the phone line is free.
To do test installs here, I have about five spare hard drives
of one sort or another. I unplug the existing drive, plug in
an empty drive, and do an install on it. In cases where I
don't want to "activate", I might remain disconnected from the
network, while messing about. I use test installs for quick tests
of various things, where the install will be thrown away later
in the day. I can erase the drive later, by using a Linux LiveCD
and running the program "dd" and erasing just the first sector
of the disk. That is the quickest way to make the disk look completely
empty, to the next installation experiment. For example, you
could use something like a Ubuntu CD, to boot and erase your
test install with a command like this (where you've verified
the address of the disk is actually "hda" and not something
else). This is enough to make a disk look empty, instantly.
dd if=/dev/zero of=/dev/hda bs=512 count=1
I see you've also posted in microsoft.public.win2000.general
and you may get more help there.
HTH,
Paul
