XP+SP1+system recovery=sudden death

[Thregwort]

Don't try this at home, kids.
Specifically...on my HP Pavilion with XP Home pre-installed did the six hour download of SP1.
Then what?
Boot time slowed to snail's pace.
Did the bootvis optimisation which just hung.
Did the AdAware scan, got rid of lurking stuff.
Still 2 minutes plus to boot.
Ran the HP partition based system recovery program to do a clean (hah!) reinstall of XP.
Result - one dead machine.
It's going nowhere, blue dos-type screen after safe mode or *last known good configuration* start up.
My guess is that post SP1, XP is so super-suspicious of any recovery that it just shuts the door.
Any ideas or fellow sufferers out there?
It's early days but one early adopter will be followed, real soon, by a million others.
What's the best plan to re-crank my machine do you think?

Thregwort,
[XP Home, HP Pavilion, IGb Celeron, 384MbRAM, Service Pack 1]

 

[linney]

See if any fellow sufferers turn up at HP.

http://bizforums.itrc.hp.com/cm/CategoryHome/1,,405!1!1,00.html

 

[Thregwort]

Yeah, linney, done that.

Got some good advice from the HP forum.
Unfortunately the recovery CDs being mailed in super-quick response from HP support is going to reformat the drive.
So I'll do a clean install of XP on a new drive and stick the old *dirty* drive in as a slave so I can rescue some important files. Then I'll format it...who knows what might be lurking there, and I don't want all this grief again.

 

[gargouille]

There is supposedly (if you install that way) a provision to remove the SP...I installed it that way and crossed my fingers and have had good luck on 2 systems with it.
Understand your HP quandary, tho, and am again glad that I build my own systems...and suffer different sets of problems

 

[Thregwort]

gargouille,

The HP/XP recovery disc doesn't include the SP1, thankfully, so after install I'll just download the vital security patches and leave it at that (wait for SP1.1?).

You build your own?
Brave man!

 

[gargouille]

Not necessarily brave...just let me say that if I try to do something I study it until I get my hands around its neck until I can choke it...tenacious, I guess! :>)
'Course I do a lotta' homework, too! AND avail myself of geek friends who know way more than I do about it...AND rely on groups.google.com and these ng's and everything else I can get from the Internet...and my wife is an IT pro, too! And I make my mistakes and try to learn from them.
Sources....

 

[bullhlms]

I'm also running XP, with SP1. When I rebooted,(following is from my log).

"Downloaded and installed SP1. Took 1:50.

Attempted re-start; no keybaord. Ran chkdsk /f which reported no problems, then re-booted normally.

Event log showed several errors."

It may be worth a try. Good luck!

 

[clownshoes]

I installed SP1 on my machine ( after 3 hour download ) thinking it may get rid of some probs I was having and lo and behold I have just spent all this morning reformating and installing xp so that i can get online to find out why SP1 slowed my pc to less than a snails pace and would not let me connect to the internet through AOL. TY TY TY mr Gate's I hope to meet you in a dark alley sometime!!

 

[Thregwort]

OK, clownshoes -
you have sympathy, hope your stuff was backed up.

Well that's two - anybody else?

 

[polymath5]

I did the network download of SP1, installed it and have had no problems on several machines I've updated. If anything the machines are running faster and some minor problems have been corrected.

BUT, I'm running a fairly straightforward setup. A Dell PW220 dual PIII600, 512MB RAM, and I did a clean install of XP Pro. For safety, I used Drive Image 2002 to create a complete backup of my existing system. Then I removed everything from my and and the 'all users' starup folder, rebooted. Turned off NAVCE realtime protection, created a restore point, and rebooted. Then I did the SP1.

As I said no problems, but having been bit by SP's in the past (anyone remember the early NT sp's?), All I can say is good luck and you have my sympathies.

I think SP1 should be used as marketing tool for Drive Image!!

 

[Thregwort]

polymath5,

Yeah, good for you, and you're the second to recommend Drive Image!!
Super caution is obviosly the way to go here.
Just clarify your
*Then I removed everything from my and and the 'all users' starup folder, rebooted.*
your what and?

thregwort

 

[polymath5]

I removed all entries under my profile's startup folder and all entries in the 'All User' start up folder. This way I knew nothing was being automatically loaded. Much better than just stopping any running programs before doing a SP. Sorry that I wasn't clearer in my description.

Just did 5 more SP1 today. All on Dell Optiplex's with Clean new XP installs, no problems. Fortunately, it doesn't matter if I blow out what's on the system. Our users aren't supposed to store anything locally. I really do feel for the home user.

 

[prebeck]

I guess I've been lucky. I wasn't able to even install SP1.
Based on what I've been hearing/reading, I wont be either.
Maybe I'll just fdisk and "downgrade" to Win2k and leave the XP disk under the truck tire.

 

[polymath5]

What happened when you tried?

 

[askIllustrator]

Well I WAS gonna try SP1 out but dont see much reason now, other than that if it does work I can finally uninstall messenger. Who in their right mind would think that ANYONE would happy with no choice in the matter. As far as clean installs go, I have found no better resource than

http://www.bootdisk.com

They have preformatted floppy images for what ever kind of install your trying to do, even some geared for HP recovery I think. The main purpose of the floppy boot is to give you CD-Rom access in case your machine wont boot from CD. You will need a full version of XP. Also, attempting a re-install on a prebuilt machine with anything but the recovery disc will probably leave you without a few obscure drivers that you will have to pain stakingly track down on the web one at a time and install manually. HAVE FUN!! BEHOLD! As Steve Jobs introduces us the latest in desk-lamp technology!

http://www.apple.com

 

[gargouille]

Yo jAQUAN!
Find the sysoc.inf file and carefully edit out the HIDE statements in it (preserving spaces) and save it. (Maybe back up the renamed file somewhere in case things to south on you...)
Then Messenger and many other installed Windoze thingies are revealed...with their .dll's down!
They also show up on the Add/Remove Programs dialog...so uninstall away!

 

[SQLScholar]

jAQUAN,

Either that or go to:-

http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_messenger.htm

it explains how to get rid of messenger - it also has a file which removes it for you. Just as a side note:- this isnt my website, and therefore cannot garentee it works, or isnt a virus.... all i can say is it worked fine for me, and my virus checker didnt say it was a virus.

cheers

Dan ----------------------------------------
Does a one legged duck swim in circles??

 

[Thregwort]

Postscript:

For what it's worth, having got the three disk XP set from HP support (FOC mailed same day) have done clean reinstall -[Stuff SP1 say I. Just apply this single crucial security patch]

http://grc.com/xpdite/xpdite.htm

 

[gargouille]

Dan:
I'd stake what little reputation I have on the reliability of what comes from Kelly's corner as I've watched/read replies from there as I also frequent the msnews.microsoft.com servers. They're always spot on.

 

[SQLScholar]

well there you have it straight from the gargouilles mouth

I thought they were a good site, but since i have only used it once i thought it was better to put a disclaimer, so that if there computer got screwed i wouldnt be in the dog house.

Cheers gargouille

Dan ----------------------------------------
Does a one legged duck swim in circles??