Which Windows Updates Causes Slowdowns?

[dakota81]

I just loaded WinXP Pro onto my media computer & grabbed all the updates off Windows Update; and unfortunately the machine was acting weird and explorer was causing small slowdowns. With explorer open to a directory of video files, the machine would "pause" every once in a while, which is definately not desirable. The machine had nothing installed besides WinXP, the updates, & all the necessary mpeg-4 codecs. The CPU usage of explorer.exe would for no reason jump to 99% about every 6 or so seconds for a duration of ~2 seconds. If I closed the directory window, the machine would run without any slowdowns.

So I reinstall & put in NO UPDATES; just the exact same codecs as before. Machine runs fine. I'm afraid to test out the Windows Updates one by one, so I'm asking if there are some that are safe & some that are questionable? My suspicion is it's SP1 that's giving me the grief; but I need SP1 to install the usb 2.0 drivers for the mobo as they're provided by M$, and via says they can't distribute usb 2.0 drivers due to liscensing agreements w/ M$.

Any advice?

FYI, this is the hardware setup:
via epia-m 10000 (integrated everything)
256meg crucial ddr
samsung 120gig hd
toshiba 16x dvd-rom

 

[linney]

819634 - You May Experience Performance Issues After You Install the 811493 (MS03-013) Package on Your Windows XP SP1-Based Computer

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;819634&FR=1&PA=1&SD=HSCH

 

[jdeane]

out of curiosity what other software are you using, I have a Epia-M 9000 multimedia pc running XP sp1 with all updates and it is running without any problems.

Jon

 

[dakota81]

I'll check for those hotfix numbers in the software add/remove. Could this fix be already by included in newer releases of the XP cd & excluded in an older version?

I don't have any software installed besides the base WinXP & the necessary mpeg-4 codecs (I know not to get like the AngelPotion codec, so I've got just divx3, divx5, xvid, & smr patchset for mp42 & mp43 vids). I'm debating between wmp7 & wmp9, don't know of that makes a difference.

Before I reinstalled WinXP, I wasn't seeing any troubles; the previous install was left over when I replaced out an XP 1700+ setup w/ the epia motherboard, so whatever was different with the install on the two different motherboards maybe?

It's the video playback where I'm now seeing frames dropped every once in a while after the reinstalling of XP. I might try out ffdshow next, that's supposidly a leaner, faster divx decoder. But more than that, I can't wait until via releases the 1.4GHz version w/ the nehemiah core they're planning.

 

[linney]

811493 (MS03-013) was only released about a month ago. The warning was released two weeks ago.

 

[nutcracker1955]

I copied thi artical, Please read on.
Microsoft is said to be looking into problems that some people have reported after installing a security patch that was issued last week. The patch - which was designed to stave off a buffer overrun that could allow attackers to elevate privilege permissions on users' machines - ended up slowing some users' systems to a crawl.
It seems that disabling your antivirus auto protect feature fixes the problem, but this work-around means that you patch one hole (the kernel) and opening up another (no auto-protect AV scanning). People have reported that this happens with Norton, McAfee and EZtrust Antivirus.

If you are having slowdown problems, you can also remove the patch for now, it is listed in Add or Remove Programs and called Windows XP Hotfix (SP2) Q811493. Hopefully Microsoft will fix the patch sooner rather than later. When you remove the 811493 patch, you could be prompted that the removal will cause the 814995 patch not to function, this is a flase "alarm", just uninstall 811493.

In some cases the patch will not be listed under Add or Remove Programs. In that case, system administrators can use the Spunist.exe utility to remove this patch. Spuninst.exe is in the %Windir%\$NTUninstallQ811493$\Spuninst folder, and it supports the following Setup switches:

/?: Display the list of installation switches.
/u: Use unattended mode.
/f: Force other programs to quit when the computer shuts down.
/z: Do not restart when installation is complete.
/q: Use Quiet mode (no user interaction).
Lets hope that Microsoft gets this patch fixed ASAP.



OK, some more information. It seems that quite a number of people are having problems with this update. I've seen reports from some computer shops indicating that 40-60 percent of their users are having severe slowdown problems.

I've had a report from the InfiniSource CEO who wasn't able to reboot his system after installing the patch, it would just hang on the black screen you normally get before the XP flag appears.

Now, I read over the security bulletin again concerning the 811493 patch, and although listed as Important, it is not critical. You see (according to the bulletin) "For an attack to be successful, an attacker would need to be able to logon interactively to the system, either at the console or through a terminal session. Also, a successful attack would require the introduction of code in order to exploit this vulnerability. Because best practices recommends restricting the ability to logon interactively on servers, this issue most directly affects client systems and terminal servers".

This means that for the average home user, this patch isn't really required. So at this point I'd suggest you do not install this patch.



Latest Info from Microsoft: Microsoft originally issued this patch on April 16, 2003. Subsequent to that date, Microsoft has received reports of performance problems with the patch from some Windows XP customers. Microsoft has investigated this issue and confirmed that there can be performance problems when the patch is applied to Windows XP Service Pack 1 systems. Microsoft is actively working on a revised patch for Windows XP Service Pack 1 and will re-issue that patch when it has been completed and fully tested. The existing Windows XP SP1 patch does address the security vulnerability.

 

[jonlog]

Nutcracker995,

When the 811493 critical update was first released I installed it in my XP Pro. It caused severe slowdowns for my XP Pro installation. At least one of my graphics programs could no longer save my photo edits.

I uninstalled 811493 on one computer as recommended and that fixed the problem. On another XP pro computer the system became unstable and had problems with other programs also. Uninstalling 811493 did not work correctly.

I clone my two hard drives on a regular basis so my only quick good solution was to boot up with my backup hard drive and booted up to my good XP Pro system. Then using PowerQuest's DriveCopy 4 I cloned the good hard drive to the slow drive and got rid of it that way.

I ended up with a good hard drive backup copy of my system.

I have the two hard drives in racks. To change from one HD to another i simply unlock one drive and lock in the other drive with a key. An easy way to switch between hard drives.

 

[Carma]

I have been having some slow down problems as well, so I checked the link listed above to Microsoft support.

It looks like they released a patch on May 28, 2003. I still need to try it out, though.

 

[bcastner]

There are no known problems with the re-released verion of this hotfix.

If you are worried it is the issue, remove it from Control Panel Add/Remove programs. You likely need to scroll to see all the hotfixes currently applied.

If Windows Update subsequently wants to re-install this hotfix, allow it.

I suspect this users problem has nothing to do with this hotfix, and a posting of error messages from his event log would likely show a different source of the problem

Start, Run, eventvwr.msc, and copy and paste the relevant portions of the error log here.