General and specific solutions for problems regarding AU/WU/MU in Windows XP

[AstroSkipper]

My essential tools for solving problems in Windows XP — Part 1 — WU/MU tools

WinUpdatesList:

WinUpdatesList is a tool from NirSoft and displays the list of all Windows updates (Service Packs and Hotfixes) installed on your local computer. For hotfix updates, this utility also displays the list of files updated with these hotfixes. In addition, it allows you to instantly open the provided link to its Microsoft website, but you have to use in most cases the Wayback Machine nowadays. It provides more information about the selected update, uninstall an update, copy the update information to the clipboard, or save it to text/HTML/XML file. The latest and presumably last version is 1.33. Language files are available too.
Links:
Homepage: https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/wul.html
Portable version: https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/wul.zip
Installer version: https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/wul_setup.exe

WinUpdatesView:

WinUpdatesView is another simple tool from NirSoft that displays the history of Windows updates on your system. WinUpdatesView can load the Windows updates history from your local system, using API, and it can also read and parse the Windows updates database file (DataStore.edb) from external drive or from remote computer on your network. For every Windows update history record, WinUpdatesView displays the following fields: Title, Description, Install Date, Update Operation (Install, Uninstall, Not Started, In Progress), Operation Result (Succeeded, Succeeded With Errors, Failed, Aborted), Category, Information URL, Support URL, Uninstall Notes, Client Application ID, Service ID, Update ID, Revision Number, Unmapped Result Code, Server Selection, hResult. The latest version is 1.17. Language files are available too.
Links:
Homepage: https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/windows_updates_history_viewer.html
Portable version: https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/winupdatesview.zip

WUMT - Windows Update MiniTool 20.12.2016:

Windows Update MiniTool (WUMT) is a free alternative to the standard Windows Update; it puts you in control of updates by allowing you to search, install, and block Windows updates as you please. WUMT can be used offline either. The version from 20.12.2016 is the last working in Windows XP.
Link: https://retrosystemsrevival.blogspot.com/2021/12/windows-update-minitool-20122016.html
Additionally, you need a file from Microsoft called wsusscn2.cab, dated from 09.12.2019, to use WUMT offline. You can get it by using the Wayback Machine.
Link: https://web.archive.org/web/20191209214827/http://download.windowsupdate.com/microsoftupdate/v6/wsusscan/wsusscn2.cab

Reset Windows Update Tool (Script):

Reset Windows Update Tool (Script) resets the Windows Update Components and is said to be working properly. Since I had no problems regarding MU/WU recently and usually prefer manual methods to keep control, it has not been tested by me, so no guarantee of success and use at your own risk. I recommend to back up your system partition completely at first or at least the Windows folder SoftwareDistribution. Here is the homepage at GitHub:  
https://github.com/ManuelGil/Script-Reset-Windows-Update-Tool
The last XP compatible version is 10.5.3.7: 
https://www.mediafire.com/file/k48ll6e41eypogy/ResetWUEng10.5.3.7.zip/file
A less recent version 10.5.3.4, with a help file included, can be downloaded here: 
https://www.mediafire.com/file/wl0yrq98me8dfkj/ResetWUEng10.5.3.4.zip/file

A list of all parts of my My essential tools for solving problems in Windows XP can be found in my post of Additional Resources.
Link: https://msfn.org/board/topic/183498-general-and-specific-solutions-for-problems-regarding-auwumu-in-windows-xp/?do=findComment&comment=1216513

Edited September 28, 2022 by AstroSkipper
Update of content

[AstroSkipper]

My essential tools for solving problems in Windows XP — Part 2 — File extractors and packers

7-zip:

7-Zip is a file archiver with a high compression ratio. The main features of 7-Zip:

- High compression ratio in 7z format with LZMA and LZMA2 compression
- Supported formats:
Packing / unpacking: 7z, XZ, BZIP2, GZIP, TAR, ZIP and WIM
Unpacking only: APFS, AR, ARJ, CAB, CHM, CPIO, CramFS, DMG, EXT, FAT, GPT, HFS, IHEX, ISO, LZH, LZMA, MBR, MSI, NSIS, NTFS, QCOW2, RAR, RPM, SquashFS, UDF, UEFI, VDI, VHD, VHDX, VMDK, WIM, XAR and Z.
- For ZIP and GZIP formats, 7-Zip provides a compression ratio that is 2-10 % better than the ratio provided by PKZip and WinZip
- Strong AES-256 encryption in 7z and ZIP formats
- Self-extracting capability for 7z format
- Integration with Windows Shell
- Powerful File Manager
- Powerful command line version
- Plugin for FAR Manager
- Localizations for 87 languages

The latest version 23.01 from 20.06.2023 still supports Wimdows XP.
Homepage: https://www.7-zip.org/
Download link of 32 Bit version: https://www.7-zip.org/a/7z2301.exe
Download link of 64 Bit version: https://www.7-zip.org/a/7z2301-x64.exe

WinRAR:

WinRAR is a powerful compression tool with many integrated additional functions to help you organize your compressed archives. WinRAR supports all popular compression formats (RAR, ZIP, CAB, ARJ, LZH, TAR, GZip, UUE, ISO, BZIP2, Z and 7-Zip). WinRAR allows you to split archives into separate volumes easily, making it possible to save them on several disks for example. WinRAR is a trial product, meaning you have the chance to thoroughly test it. The program can be used absolutely free of charge for 40 days!
Last version compatible with Windows XP is WinRAR 6.02. Higher versions don't support Windows XP anymore.

Download link of 32 Bit version: https://dl.filehorse.com/win/compression-and-backup/winrar-32/wrar602.exe?st=SbzTXEEXkA-QIyqb3giTsg&e=1656381022&fn=wrar602.exe&x-clickref=1101lvURYqNr
Download link of 64 Bit version: https://dl.filehorse.com/win/compression-and-backup/winrar-64/winrar-x64-602.exe?st=MBUaNQiVXmgEmCOyR9_WSg&e=1656381255&fn=winrar-x64-602.exe&x-clickref=1101lvURYwRa

UniExtract2:

Universal Extractor 2 is a tool to extract files from any type of archive or installer. After the release of UniExtract2 2.0.0 RC 3 in 2020, a new nightly build has been uploaded last month, UniExtract2 2.0.0 RC 4 Nightly (15.10.2023). Below are the download links of both versions: 

Link to UniExtract2 2.0.0 RC 3: https://github.com/Bioruebe/UniExtract2/releases/download/v2.0.0-rc.3/UniExtractRC3.zip
Link to UniExtract2 2.0.0 RC 4 Nightly (15.10.2023): https://update.bioruebe.com/uniextract/files/nightly.zip

innoextract:

Inno Setup is a tool to create installers for Microsoft Windows applications. innoextract allows extracting such installers without running the actual setup executable. innoextract currently supports installers created by Inno Setup 1.2.10 to 6.2.1
The current version of innoextract is 1.9.

Download link: https://constexpr.org/innoextract/files/innoextract-1.9-windows.zip

KB_Extractor:

KB_Extractor is a special extractor for Microsoft updates. The last version is 1.2 from 26-06-2011. Simply drag the update you wish to extract onto the pre-saved executable, and wait for the extraction to complete.

Download link: https://www.vistax64.com/attachments/kb_extractor-exe.23613/

A list of all parts of my My essential tools for solving problems in Windows XP can be found in my post of Additional Resources.
Link: https://msfn.org/board/topic/183498-general-and-specific-solutions-for-problems-regarding-auwumu-in-windows-xp/?do=findComment&comment=1216513

Edited November 13, 2023 by AstroSkipper
Update of content

[AstroSkipper]

Hi to all of you! I've tested the MU website version using the brandnew TLS 1.3 proxy ProxyMII created by @cmalex. And what can I say? It works perfectly.  Fully compatible! 

Cheers, AstroSkipper 

Edited July 22, 2022 by AstroSkipper

[thomasxxx]

Solution for error code 0x800b010b while trying to install updates from WU/MU (While installing NET FRAMEWORK 4 POS UPDATES)

1- Start>Run type, "secedit /configure /cfg %windir%\repair\secsetup.inf /db secsetup.sdb /verbose" (without quotes)

2- Be sure that your certificates are up to date

3- Be sure, windows firewall or your personal AV/firewall is disable while doing whole process.

[AstroSkipper]

On 8/19/2022 at 1:02 PM, thomasxxx said:

Solution for error code 0x800b010b while trying to install updates from WU/MU (While installing NET FRAMEWORK 4 POS UPDATES)

1- Start>Run type, "secedit /configure /cfg %windir%\repair\secsetup.inf /db secsetup.sdb /verbose" (without quotes)

2- Be sure that your certificates are up to date

3- Be sure, windows firewall or your personal AV/firewall is disable while doing whole process.

Hello @thomasxxx! Thanks a lot for posting a new solution! You see very easy to post here. One recommendation for further posting. Use bold text and font size 18 for the headline only due to a better visibility! When someone reads your post, the headline stings you right in the eye and the reader knows immediately what this is about. Just a recommendation, of cource! Anyway, this is a good post, and your English is totally ok. 

Edited September 28, 2022 by AstroSkipper

[AstroSkipper]

On 8/19/2022 at 4:53 PM, AstroSkipper said:

On 8/19/2022 at 1:02 PM, thomasxxx said:

Solution for error code 0x800b010b while trying to install updates from WU/MU (While installing NET FRAMEWORK 4 POS UPDATES)

1- Start>Run type, "secedit /configure /cfg %windir%\repair\secsetup.inf /db secsetup.sdb /verbose" (without quotes)

2- Be sure that your certificates are up to date

3- Be sure, windows firewall or your personal AV/firewall is disable while doing whole process.

Hello @thomasxxx! Thanks a lot for posting a new solution! You see very easy to post here. One recommendation for further posting. Use bold text and font size 18 for the headline only due to better visibility! When someone reads your post, the headline stings you right in the eye and the reader knows immediately what this is about. Just a recommendation, of cource! Anyway, this is a good post, and your English is totally ok. 

Hi @thomasxxx! Thanks again for posting your solution! Although I can't test this solution (No problems here at all!) I've listed it in the third post under Specific solutions: https://msfn.org/board/topic/183498-general-and-specific-solutions-for-problems-regarding-auwumu-in-windows-xp/?do=findComment&comment=1216507

Cheers, AstroSkipper

 

[AstroSkipper]

My essential tools for solving problems in Windows XP — Part 3 — Text, hex, resource, and registry editors

Notepad++:

Notepad++ is a text and source code editor for use with Microsoft Windows. It supports tabbed editing, which allows working with multiple open files in a single window. For me, one of the best text editors ever! The last version which has been compatible with Windows XP is Notepad++ 7.9.2.

Download link: https://notepad-plus-plus.org/downloads/v7.9.2/ 

HxD:

HxD is a carefully designed and fast hex editor which, additionally to raw disk editing and modifying of main memory (RAM), handles files of any size. The easy to use interface offers features such as searching and replacing, exporting, checksums/digests, insertion of byte patterns, a file shredder, concatenation or splitting of files, statistics and much more. HxD is free of charge for private and commercial use. The last version which is compatible with Windows XP is HxD 2.5.0.0.

Download links: 
Installer version: https://mh-nexus.de/downloads/HxDSetup.zip 
Portable version: https://mh-nexus.de/downloads/HxDPortableSetup.zip 

WinHex - Computer Forensics & Data Recovery Software, Hex Editor & Disk Editor:

WinHex is in its core a universal hexadecimal editor, particularly helpful in the realm of computer forensics, data recovery, low-level data processing, and IT security. An advanced tool for everyday and emergency use: inspect and edit all kinds of files, recover deleted files or lost data from hard drives with corrupt file systems or from digital camera cards. Features depend on the license type, among them:

• Disk editor for hard disks, floppy disks, CD-ROM & DVD, ZIP, Smart Media, Compact Flash, ...
• Native support for FAT12/16/32, exFAT, NTFS, Ext2/3/4, Next3®, CDFS, UDF
• Built-in interpretation of RAID systems and dynamic disks
• Various data recovery techniques
• RAM editor, providing access to physical RAM and other processes' virtual memory
• Data interpreter, knowing 20 data types
• Editing data structures using templates (e.g. to repair partition table/boot sector)
• Concatenating and splitting files, unifying and dividing odd and even bytes/words
• Analyzing and comparing files
• Particularly flexible search and replace functions
• Disk cloning (under DOS with X-Ways Replica)
• Drive images & backups (optionally compressed or split into 650 MB archives)
• Simple scripting
• 256-bit AES encryption, checksums, CRC32, hashes (MD5, SHA-1, ...)
• Erase (wipe) confidential files securely, hard drive cleansing to protect your privacy
• Import all clipboard formats, incl. ASCII hex values
• Convert between binary, hex ASCII, Intel Hex, and Motorola S
• Character sets: ANSI ASCII, IBM ASCII, EBCDIC, (Unicode)
• Instant window switching. Printing. Random-number generator.
• Supports files of any size. Very fast. Easy to use. Extensive program help.
• More

The latest version WinHex 20.6 is compatible with Windows XP. The program do not need any installation. It's portable. You can try out WinHex for free, it's not limited in time, but functionally restricted.

Download links:
Portable version: https://www.x-ways.net/winhex.zip 
User manual: https://x-ways.net/winhex/manual.pdf

Resource Hacker:

Resource Hacker is a resource editor for 32bit and 64bit Windows® applications. It's both a resource compiler (for *.rc files), and a decompiler - enabling viewing and editing of resources in executables (*.exe; *.dll; *.scr; etc) and compiled resource libraries (*.res, *.mui). While Resource Hacker™ is primarily a GUI application, it also provides many options for compiling and decompiling resources from the command-line. I think Resource Hacker is one of the best in this category. The latest version is Resource Hacker 5.1.8 (360) and compatible with Windows XP. Unfortunately, the installer (exe file) doesn't work anymore in Windows XP, but the portable version (zip file) does.

Download links: 
Exe file: http://www.angusj.com/resourcehacker/reshacker_setup.exe 
Zip file: http://www.angusj.com/resourcehacker/resource_hacker.zip 

Registrar Registry Manager:

Registrar Registry Manager 9.20 is a registry editor which is still supported in Windows XP. Hompage: https://www.resplendence.com/registrar
There is a Free Home Edition: https://www.resplendence.com/download/RegistrarHomeV9.exe  and a commercial Professional Edition.

Registry Workshop:

My favourite registry editor is Registry Workshop (current version is 5.1.0). Link: http://www.torchsoft.com/en/rw_information.html 
It is still supported in Windows XP, but it's commercial. This program is definitely worth its money. You can try it 30 days for free. Here are the download links of the English and German version 5.1.0 (other language versions are also available):
English version: http://www.torchsoft.com/download/RegistryWorkshop.exe
German version: http://www.torchsoft.com/download/RegistryWorkshop_deu.exe

PCRegedit: 

PCRegedit is a Linux Live CD based, easy-to-use tool to create, delete, edit the Windows registry key-values due to your needs without booting from Windows. You can use it to fix Windows Registry key-values when it is maliciously altered by virus, when you are going to edit key-values, inaccessible in your Windows system, or when it simply doesn't start anymore. In a nutshell, using PCRegedit, you can get full access to your Windows registry from outside if necessary.

Download link: https://raymondcc.r.worldssl.net/PCRegedit-51.iso  

A list of all parts of my My essential tools for solving problems in Windows XP can be found in my post of Additional Resources.
Link: https://msfn.org/board/topic/183498-general-and-specific-solutions-for-problems-regarding-auwumu-in-windows-xp/?do=findComment&comment=1216513

 

Edited October 17, 2022 by AstroSkipper
Update of content

[jaclaz]

For use under XP, JFYI,Tiny Hexer is an useful hex editor that has templates/structure viewers:

https://www.softpedia.com/get/Others/Miscellaneous/tiny-hexer.shtml

some structure viewers for it (shameless plug):

http://reboot.pro/topic/8734-tiny-hexer-scripts/

jaclaz

[AstroSkipper]

On 9/29/2022 at 9:49 AM, jaclaz said:

For use under XP, JFYI,Tiny Hexer is an useful hex editor that has templates/structure viewers:

https://www.softpedia.com/get/Others/Miscellaneous/tiny-hexer.shtml

some structure viewers for it (shameless plug):

http://reboot.pro/topic/8734-tiny-hexer-scripts/

jaclaz

Thanks for the hint! Never heard of it! I'll have a look at this tool at the next opportunity.

Cheers, AstroSkipper

[AstroSkipper]

On 9/29/2022 at 9:49 AM, jaclaz said:

For use under XP, JFYI,Tiny Hexer is an useful hex editor that has templates/structure viewers:

https://www.softpedia.com/get/Others/Miscellaneous/tiny-hexer.shtml

some structure viewers for it (shameless plug):

http://reboot.pro/topic/8734-tiny-hexer-scripts/

jaclaz

On 10/5/2022 at 2:12 PM, AstroSkipper said:

Thanks for the hint! Never heard of it! I'll have a look at this tool at the next opportunity.

Cheers, AstroSkipper

Hello @jaclaz! I've installed your recommended hex editor Tiny Hexer, and it's an interesting alternative. But frankly, my recommended tools HxD and WinHex are more recent, full of additional features, and still getting updates unlike Tiny Hexer. In most cases, I use WinHex to modify files, and I am very happy with it for years.  Nonetheless, thanks again for your recommendation!

Kind regards, AstroSkipper

Edited October 20, 2022 by AstroSkipper

[jaclaz]

The issue with most hex viewers is that they show you the hex but do not have a way to show the meaning of the hex, the possibility of having templates/structure viewers is important, Winhex is an excellent program but commercial and relatively high priced, here is a page listing many other suitable ones (depending on the OS):

https://github.com/dloss/binary-parsing

the extreme fragmentation (and lack of a standard of sorts) has led to a Tower of Babel and templates/structure viewers are mostly self-written (and never published), Kaitai:

http://kaitai.io/

hopes to change the situation, but - besides being rather complex - it is too early to say if it will be (hopefully) more widely adopted.

Tiny Hexer is discontinued, but it works and needs not updates, it simply does what is supposed to do, like hundreds or thousands other programs, updates - generally speaking - have some meaning in either programs that are affected by the outside world - like browsers - or that are an incomplete crappy mess, like most of what today are called "apps".

 

jaclaz
 

 

[AstroSkipper]

On 10/21/2022 at 1:19 PM, jaclaz said:

The issue with most hex viewers is that they show you the hex but do not have a way to show the meaning of the hex, the possibility of having templates/structure viewers is important, Winhex is an excellent program but commercial and relatively high priced, here is a page listing many other suitable ones (depending on the OS):

https://github.com/dloss/binary-parsing

the extreme fragmentation (and lack of a standard of sorts) has led to a Tower of Babel and templates/structure viewers are mostly self-written (and never published), Kaitai:

http://kaitai.io/

hopes to change the situation, but - besides being rather complex - it is too early to say if it will be (hopefully) more widely adopted.

Tiny Hexer is discontinued, but it works and needs not updates, it simply does what is supposed to do, like hundreds or thousands other programs, updates - generally speaking - have some meaning in either programs that are affected by the outside world - like browsers - or that are an incomplete crappy mess, like most of what today are called "apps".

 

jaclaz
 

 

@jaclaz, thanks for the links and further recommendations! In my series "My essential tools for solving problems in Windows XP", I listed my favourite tools I use for years and helped me a lot. Here is the link to the list of all parts: https://msfn.org/board/topic/183498-general-and-specific-solutions-for-problems-regarding-auwumu-in-windows-xp/?do=findComment&comment=1216513 Most of them are well-known, easy to use, and quite up-to-date. Tiny Hexer is a good and useful tool, no doubt. And, you are right, the newer does not necessarily mean better. And of course, there are other programs which really need regular updates. But, Tiny Hexer was abandoned in 2007, the last version is 1.8.1.6 of July 2007. No further development since that time! I fear that compatibility with all newly created binaries will sooner or later suffer from this circumstance. In other words, I don't like to entrust important files to such an old tool for modification anymore, at most very old files. Spoken for me only, of course! Apart from that, the presentation of the files to be edited is much clearer in WinHex, especially the customization of the text area on the right which represents the text interpretation of the hex values. All in all, Tiny Hexer seems very old-fashioned, but nonetheless, it worked with the files I tried to edit. So everything is fine. 

Cheers, AstroSkipper 

Edited November 6, 2022 by AstroSkipper

[AstroSkipper]

Legacy Update - An alternative to Microsoft or Windows Update

Legacy Update is a community-run resource to help you fix the Windows Update service on earlier versions of Windows. More information and instructions can be found on the homepage of Legacy Update.
Here is the link: https://legacyupdate.net/
And this is the download link of the program which is needed to be installed: https://content.legacyupdate.net/legacyupdate/LegacyUpdate-1.6.2.exe
Changelogs & older versions on GitHub: https://github.com/kirb/LegacyUpdate/releases 
Some screenshots of this service:



I didn't try this service, no need for me at the moment, but as far as I read in different comments, it works properly with Windows XP and other OSs. Thanks to @maile3241 for the hint!

Cheers, AstroSkipper

Edited January 31, 2023 by AstroSkipper
Update of content

[mina7601]

14 minutes ago, AstroSkipper said:

And this is the download link of the program which is needed to be installed: https://content.legacyupdate.net/legacyupdate/LegacyUpdate-1.1.exe

This is the latest download link at the moment: https://content.legacyupdate.net/legacyupdate/LegacyUpdate-1.2.1.exe 

[AstroSkipper]

3 minutes ago, mina7601 said:

This is the latest download link at the moment: https://content.legacyupdate.net/legacyupdate/LegacyUpdate-1.2.1.exe 

Thank you, @mina7601! They must have updated the link in the last minutes. I will correct that immediately.