PC's froze this morning

[Electron]

So I have two computers using Vista SP1 and both get turned off every night.
This morning started up the first pc and everything went fine during boot and
log-in. Then when I tried to start an application the p.c froze with the
round "hour-glass" timer showing. Didin't think much of it. I re-booted and
everything was fine. Started up the 2nd p.c. a while later and exactly the
same problem, only this time I went for the "start" menu first and not an
application. Now I think this is quite odd. The same problem on different
p.c.'s on the same day using the same operating system. Re-booted the 2nd
p.c. and again everything is okay. Anyone else have the same problem today?

 

[Dave H.]

Same here. I have six PCs on a LAN at home, and the two running Vista
weren't accessible using LogMeIn from work today. (they'd been fine earlier
before I left for work) The other four - XP and Server 2003 - were fine,
although they couldn't access the two Vista machines across the local network
either.

When I got home to check it out, it was just like you said - they locked up
almost as soon as I touched the mouse and had to be hard-booted. Couldn't
see anything in Event Viewer that gave me any clues. I'm thinking some kind
of update gone awry.

 

[Electron]

Yes, now that you mention it, there was an update I loaded yesterday on both
machines.

 

[Greg]

Same here. Both our computers (one a laptop one desktop) are frozen and only
working without crashing in safe mode. I had mine set to update
automatically. Have tried going back restore points but that resets the
settings as well, so even though I change the settings not to install
updates automatically, it reverts when I go back to the restore point before
the updates that caused this problem, so then when I boot in normal mode it
immediately updates again. Catch 22. How do we get our computers to work
again? And you can't run the Windows Update program in safe mode. How stupid
is that?

MORONIC MICROSOFT PRODUCTS! ARRRGGGGGGGGGGH!

 

[Dave H.]

My story gets even worse. I tried putting SP3 on one of the XP machines last
night. When I rebooted this morning, my machine would get to the Windows
logo, then briefly flash a blue screen error (WAY too fast to be able to see
what it said) and spontaneously reboot. "Last know good configuration"
didn't help, so I booted into Safe Mode and am currently uninstalling SP3.

I'm going to be extremely unhappy if I have to reload this machine again
since I just reloaded it a few weeks ago (and spent the usual entire day
doing do) and it's been running like a champ ever since. Now it's apparently
hosed, thanks to Microsoft and their stupid updates.

I now have automatic updates disabled on ALL my computers and will not be
trusting Microsoft's advice on what to install on my machine again.

 

[Dave H.]

Disconnect your computer from the Internet before you restore it. Then it
won't be able to apply the update automatically.