Trouble with Service Pack 2

[Talamarr]

Hello all.

This one is kind of long but it is necessary to give background and What I have tried to this point.

I have been reading through the posts and have not found the answer that I was looking for, or I did not understand if I did, so I thought that this would be a better way to find the answer.

I work as a PC Technician for a Healthcare products company and the PC that I use was chosen to test Service Pack 2 before we roll out to the other PCs in places like Engineering and Payroll.

The computer in question is a Dell Optiplex, GX260, P4 2.66, 512 DDR and a Dell Motherboard. Windows XP Pro 2002 SP 1 from dell.

OK, so I ran Adaware 6, with the latest defs, I have Symantec Client Security version 9 in a Managed Environment - all reported clean. I created a Restore Point just to be on the safe side and backed up my log files that were not on the network share. I then downloaded the SP2 Distro for IT rollout and ran the installation for it.

Everything seemed to be running fine untill the restart, where we go down hill from there.

Where before my pc only took about 2 mins to powerup and be ready to work, that included mapping the network drives, now it takes 15 mins. Half of my services are non functional, they do not start no matter what their start up status is and they can not be started maually. Print Spooler, Cryptographic services, RPC all of that minor stuff no longer functions. Windows Firewall is not installed and can not be installed because the Cryptographic service can not verify the installer CRC.

After about an hour of trying to figure out what went wrong I decided to uninstall SP 2 and then try it again. It was at this point that I discovered that the Uninstall Wizard does not function. The wizard gets to the point where it says "Restoring Cataolgs" and encounters a critical error - File can not be found. I attempted to unistall by going to c:\windows\ntuninstalsp\unistalsp\unistalsp.exe only to have the same error. Can not find the specified file.

OK, I then attempted to boot into safe mode and run system restore. only to have the following error come up: "System Restore in unable to protect your PC, please restart windows and try again. " This error comes up in safe mode and normal mode.

After searching this site, microsoft, and dell, I contacted dell to see if they had any words of wisdom. Maybe I just was not holding my mouth right. They were of no help either saying that you have already done everything that we would have you do. Call Microsoft's Service pack 2 help line.

OK! So I call them and mr. Technical support Professional listens to the above explaination, asks about the windows firewall again and then places me on hold.

When he comes back he states that what I have is a failed install of SP2 and we are going to have to force the uninstallation of the Service pack through Recovery Console on the CD. REALLY???!!!! I never would have guessed that.

OK, I cant do that at this point in time because low and behold I discover that there is a backup program that runs on my computer that does not run anywhere else. Mr. Technical Support Professional states that a forced roll back should not destabalize the system but he can not make any guarntees.

So I have said all that to ask the following question. Does anyone have even the slightest clue as to what the &(*&*(& is going on? Because even thought I am an MCP for XP Pro I am unfortunatley clueless as to the cause of this current delima. And more to the point I can not use my PC in its current state so I have to either uninstall SP 2 and hope that everything functions or wipe everything out, reinstall and go from there.

Did I skip a step somewhere or is this on of the 10% computer problems they were talking about?

[Spyder2k]

I know this isn't the answer you're looking for, sorry, but your best bet is to re-install a slipstreamed sp2. I recommend this because it sounds more like you're have a multitude of minor problems. A reinstall may prove more time-efficient.

[the_n00b]

sypder2k said the best solution.

And then, its actually amazing that you have this many problems with it. Yes, SP2 did give a few headaches, but not in the manner and extent you describe. You have factual errors in your post. There's many glaring inconsistencies there, if you take the time to understand what you read.

Is this propaganda to dissuade newbies from using SP2 and protecting their PCs? Because they can get easily swayed with the extent of jargon and detail you use there - they won't understand the facts, that many of the above is wrong, and cannot happen. See how carefully worded his post is!

If you (or anyone else) wants a full rebuttal on why the above looks a made-up case, tell me - since that will take time to say it all, I will leave it to you to get the facts.

I'd sort of be surprised if this talamarr guy comes back to see this thread at all. A one-post hit-n-run poster!

[myluvnttl]

First of all, before you decided to test SP2, you should have make sure there was no spyware, and the two program you mention, Ad-Ware and Norton, is the two in which I would NOT advise in using. I use Spybot, SpySweeper.

The reason why you can not do a restore, is that, when it try to back-date, it found a protected file that got mess up, so it will not let you restore to a back-date, due mainly to virus inside one your file.

Look inside the regedit for the program that will run when Window boot-up, and disable what you don't want to boot-up, and one thing, ALWAYS do a scan in Safe Mode.

[DakotaSunRunner]

Hi,

Yes I would agree with the explanations given here by the other guys. It sounds to me like your system has become corrupt with a multitude of problems. You can rack your brain for the next day or two and still not get anywhere, especially if you canot get into windows properly.

Your best bet: reinstall everything. the windows install will format and take care of everything. I see no other real option here.

I installed sp2 on my families computer (mom and dad) and they have had no problem and it is a brand new dell.

I hope all works out for you, as I now exactly how frustrating this can be, I went through this problem a week ago and I installed everything over again.

Take care now and good luck to you.

Dakota SunRunner

[Talamarr]

Thanks for replying.

And be suprised th_noob, I was interested in hearing what was posted. Personally I dont care if anyone uses SP2. Its your computer do what you want and if it wasn't happening to me I would not believe it either.

The simple fact is that I have a bad DL of SP 2. Will it cause problems other places? Maybe or maybe not.

Mine is not the first computer to have SP 2 installed on it, it is the first one of 250 identically configured computers that we have in our production area. SO that is why I am freaking out about this.

Any glaring problems you might have with the explaniation is a result of the fact that this entire fiasco was one glaring problem after another.

I use Norton Enterprise 9 because that is what my company has contracted for, not out of personal choice. I am currently advocating a switch to Computer Associates Enterprise AV.

I forgot to add that I did use Spybot SD and Spydoctor as well as Adaware 6 to check for spyware and they all came back negative. Norton Managed Services 9 is the controlling AV server and so far it has not let us down, maybe this is the first.

I have decided to attempt the forced Roll back through the Recovery console just because I have tried everything else and nothing is working like it is suppose to.

If that fails then I will have to spend the next 4 hours or so reinstalling this computer. Not a big deal but I have to make sure that everything can be put back and right now I am not sure if that can be accomplished. SO I have not attempted the Rollback yet.

[CoffeeFiend]

Some installs seem to go wrong like that - windows 2k, xp, or service pack. You got 2 main options at that point. Spend a week trying looking at errors, debugging, testing, diagnostics, etc (logged modes, nt event logs, bootvis, you name it). You end up spending great deals of time and usually it never fixes all the issues, the pc is so messed up that it will definately cause more issues in the future - or spend a couple hours to reinstall it clean and not have problems with it down the road... When an install goes bad like that (or crashes during the windows install or something similar), I don't waste time with it, it's just not worth it.