Computer Crashes after Microsoft Vista Updates

[epl16]

My wife and I purchased a Dell Inspiron E1705 laptop with Microsoft Windows
Vista Home Premium edition installed as the operating system back in March.
Everything was working fine until July 15. On the previous day, Windows
Update automatically installed some "critical updates". When we restarted
the computer on 7/15, we received an error code # 0xC004F050. Basically it
says that the Vista product key is invalid, and we could not start the
computer. After 2 days of talking to Dell and Microsoft, it was decided that
the only solution to the problem is to restore the computer to its original
factory settings, basically act as though the computer just came out of the
box. All of our pictures, music, files, and many other irreplacible items
were lost as a result of this problem.

After a few days of being extremely upset, we eventually got over it. Then
it happened again. On November 16th, Windows automatically updated again.
When the computer was restarted on the 17th, we got the exact same message.
So, once again, I called Dell and Microsoft and they said that the only fix
was to restore the computer to its original factory settings again. As
before, we lost even more pictures, music, etc.

I'm curious if anyone else has had this problem, and if they did, how they
fixed it. I'm extremely concerned that this is happening. We're not doing
anything wrong, just installing the "critical updates" as recommended by
Microsoft. As of now, we have had to disable Windows Update so it doesn't
happen again, but we're concerned that this may leave us vulnerable.

There's no price that can be put on the items that we lost, including
wedding pictures, numerous work files, etc. I just want this problem to be
addressed by someone to ensure that it won't continue to happen.

Eric

 

[Chuck]

Usually, this sort of problem can be caused by several things.
Dell resident background software that is not compatable with the update.
A hardware compatability issue or a BIOS problem
Malware
An active anitvirus or similar programs during the update.

Generally, with this behavior, you should set the updater to download
updates, and manually install them, one, or a very limited number at a
time. This allows you to find out what the update was intended to do, and
what areas of the P/C are involved.

 

[HeyBub]

I'm curious if anyone else has had this problem, and if they did, how
they fixed it. I'm extremely concerned that this is happening.

No, not really. Most folks backup their important stuff.

 

[Charlie Tame]

My wife and I purchased a Dell Inspiron E1705 laptop with Microsoft Windows
Vista Home Premium edition installed as the operating system back in March.
Everything was working fine until July 15. On the previous day, Windows
Update automatically installed some "critical updates". When we restarted
the computer on 7/15, we received an error code # 0xC004F050. Basically it
says that the Vista product key is invalid, and we could not start the
computer. After 2 days of talking to Dell and Microsoft, it was decided that
the only solution to the problem is to restore the computer to its original
factory settings, basically act as though the computer just came out of the
box. All of our pictures, music, files, and many other irreplacible items
were lost as a result of this problem.

After a few days of being extremely upset, we eventually got over it. Then
it happened again. On November 16th, Windows automatically updated again.
When the computer was restarted on the 17th, we got the exact same message.
So, once again, I called Dell and Microsoft and they said that the only fix
was to restore the computer to its original factory settings again. As
before, we lost even more pictures, music, etc.

I'm curious if anyone else has had this problem, and if they did, how they
fixed it. I'm extremely concerned that this is happening. We're not doing
anything wrong, just installing the "critical updates" as recommended by
Microsoft. As of now, we have had to disable Windows Update so it doesn't
happen again, but we're concerned that this may leave us vulnerable.

There's no price that can be put on the items that we lost, including
wedding pictures, numerous work files, etc. I just want this problem to be
addressed by someone to ensure that it won't continue to happen.

Eric

Eric, at the very least you should get into the habit of burning your
pictures to CD / DVD, similarly with MP3 music files etc. You can also
get something like Acronis to back up the whole thing, but of course
that only works if you have a second drive in the machine because the
factory restore will kill your system drive if that's your only way out
of the problem.


One of the updates is changing the hardware signature enough to trigger
Windows Product Activation - Microsoft's flagship implementation of self
inflicted foot shooting - it thinks you stole Vista and put it on
another computer, so it is probably just a hardware driver that's
changing the ID of a bit of hardware. You should be permitted to
reactivate upon explaining things on the phone and offering them some
kind of sacrifice (Wife, daughter, Shoeless Joe Jackson signed baseball
etc) and I am not understanding why, if you spoke with MS they did not
think of this. True it is really Dell's responsibility but hey, this is
really dumb and dumber we're discussing so try calling again to Dell,
tell them you want a full refund as they have sold you an inoperable
system and all expenses paid by them. Offer them the option to send a
tech round at their expense.

That way you'll maybe get a tech on the phone who can actually recognize
a computer.

You cannot go on like this, it is not right and MS need to get this
garbage fixed pronto before they lose thousands of irritated customers.

I've been a Microsoft user for as many years as Microsoft have existed,
but have switched all my personal machines and some at work to Linux
simply because of this.

 

[Charlie Tame]

I have used Vista since Nov. 2006 and have it running on 10 personel
systems at home and have set it up on so many others I would have reveiw
the sales records in the mainframe to get an exact number.

We should all say a prayer for the users of your "Many others".

 

[zachd [MSFT]]

That's dumb on their part. What's the service request number here? Who
exactly did you work with at Microsoft?

0xc004f050 is indeed "Error: The Software Licensing Service reported that
the product key is invalid".
Doesn't it allow you to reenter a new key at that point in time?

Did they have you format the drive? If you simply did a reinstall/upgrade,
it should have kept your data. Does the Dell "factory reset" wipe the
drive?

If the product key you have is invalid, that would seem to be a problem that
the company that issued you that key - Dell- should be able to sort out for
you. Probably you don't want to continue using that key. If you
reinstalled using that same key again, you probably are just in a bad state
waiting to happen right now and thus probably would want a better solution.

 

[NoStop]

My wife and I purchased a Dell Inspiron E1705 laptop with Microsoft
Windows Vista Home Premium edition installed as the operating system back
in March.
Everything was working fine until July 15. On the previous day, Windows
Update automatically installed some "critical updates". When we restarted
the computer on 7/15, we received an error code # 0xC004F050. Basically
it says that the Vista product key is invalid, and we could not start the
computer. After 2 days of talking to Dell and Microsoft, it was decided
that the only solution to the problem is to restore the computer to its
original factory settings, basically act as though the computer just came
out of the
box. All of our pictures, music, files, and many other irreplacible items
were lost as a result of this problem.

After a few days of being extremely upset, we eventually got over it.
Then
it happened again. On November 16th, Windows automatically updated again.
When the computer was restarted on the 17th, we got the exact same
message. So, once again, I called Dell and Microsoft and they said that
the only fix
was to restore the computer to its original factory settings again. As
before, we lost even more pictures, music, etc.

I'm curious if anyone else has had this problem, and if they did, how they
fixed it. I'm extremely concerned that this is happening. We're not
doing anything wrong, just installing the "critical updates" as
recommended by
Microsoft. As of now, we have had to disable Windows Update so it doesn't
happen again, but we're concerned that this may leave us vulnerable.

There's no price that can be put on the items that we lost, including
wedding pictures, numerous work files, etc. I just want this problem to
be addressed by someone to ensure that it won't continue to happen.

Eric

Go and get a copy of Ubuntu ... the livecd version. This will allow you to
bootup your computer from the CD/DVDROM drive and run Linux Ubuntu from
that drive. This will give you access to all your Windoze files, even if
Windoze itself won't boot. This way you can at least figure out a way to
get the needed data files off your drive before you lose them again.

You can download the livecd from here ...

http://releases.ubuntu.com/gutsy/

Once you download the ISO file, you'll need to burn that image on to a CD-R
disk.

When you finally get totally fed up with Vista and what it's been doing to
your life, you might even consider installing Ubuntu on that computer. That
can also be done from this livecd.

Cheers.

--
Remove Vista Activation Completely ...
http://tinyurl.com/2w8qqo

Frank - seek help immediately! Visit ...
http://www.binsa.org/

 

[Frank]

epl16 wrote:




Go and get a copy of Ubuntu ... the livecd version. This will allow you to
bootup your computer from the CD/DVDROM drive and run Linux Ubuntu from
that drive. This will give you access to all your Windoze files, even if
Windoze itself won't boot. This way you can at least figure out a way to
get the needed data files off your drive before you lose them again.

You can download the livecd from here ...

http://releases.ubuntu.com/gutsy/

Once you download the ISO file, you'll need to burn that image on to a CD-R
disk.

When you finally get totally fed up with Vista and what it's been doing to
your life, you might even consider installing Ubuntu on that computer. That
can also be done from this livecd.

Cheers.

Really dumb idea!
Frank

 

[Paul Knudsen]

There's no price that can be put on the items that we lost, including
wedding pictures, numerous work files, etc. I just want this problem to be
addressed by someone to ensure that it won't continue to happen.

Computers fail for whatever reason. Back up files you want to keep.