Vista - Automatic Updates

Does Microsoft allways have to mess things up more before they eventually fix
them? I FINALLY got Vista runing smooth with the new drivers that recently
were released. I was having problems with programs and games running slow,
especially video in them and opening multiple windows within the programs
themselves. Then my lovely O.S. (or it it P.O.S?) downloaded the mast recent
automatic updates and asked me if I wanted to install them, so I was like
sure updates are good. Well my programs went backwards and were actually
worse than before. Then I decided that, hey I can allways use the restore
point and wallah back to good performance right? WRONG. I did the restore
point and even shut the comp down and restarted it. After this now my
programs are STILL slower than dog crap AGAIN after it took me sever hours to
get it working somewhat top notch. So what I was wondering is Restore doesn't
actually restore your computer to previous point but basically is an
uninstall program that dopesn't seem to get EVERYTHING back to the way it was
at that particulat point in time correct? Do I have to reinstall all the
drivers I downloaded and never update windows via the automating update
prcess again? Oh, and don't even get me started on the random shutdowns and
crashes for absolutely no reason even while the comp is perfectly idle.

Hi Velosity,

Next time, uninstall the updates instead of doing a restore point. Also, check and see if they are updates that you want to have installed before installing. (Ex: you may not always want Windows Update's driver updates when you have your own more up to date ones)

Q: So what I was wondering is Restore doesn't actually restore your computer to previous point but basically is an uninstall program that doesn't seem to get EVERYTHING back to the way it was at that particulat point in time correct?

A: Think of it as a undo button, but for your OS. Yes unfortunately, sometimes it doesn't fix the problem.

Q: Do I have to reinstall all the drivers I downloaded and never update windows via the automating update process again?

A: It depends on whether the restore point included the drivers or not. I would double check the driver versions to be safe. There's no reason why you shouldn't use Windows Update. Most of the time you will need the updates it offers. You can always disable the automatic part and run it manually to have better control of what is or isn't installed.

For your random restarts and crashes, I would check to see if you had up to date Video, BIOS, & Motherboard chipset drivers for a start. Then also make sure that it's not getting overheated to.

Hope this helps you,
Shawn

velosity wrote:

> I was having problems with programs and games
> running slow, especially video in them and opening multiple windows within
> the programs themselves.

Guess it's time that you changed your name from "velosity" to "slowdown".

Love and Kisses,
Doris


--
My Microsoft Hero (he loves this company!) ... http://tinyurl.com/yp9cn2
Title Says It All ... http://tinyurl.com/2ssodl

"velosity" wrote
> Does Microsoft allways have to mess things up more before they eventually
> fix
> them? I FINALLY got Vista runing smooth with the new drivers that recently
> were released. I was having problems with programs and games running slow,
> especially video in them and opening multiple windows within the programs
> themselves. Then my lovely O.S. (or it it P.O.S?) downloaded the mast
> recent
> automatic updates and asked me if I wanted to install them, so I was like
> sure updates are good. Well my programs went backwards and were actually
> worse than before. Then I decided that, hey I can allways use the restore
> point and wallah back to good performance right? WRONG. I did the restore
> point and even shut the comp down and restarted it. After this now my
> programs are STILL slower than dog crap AGAIN after it took me sever hours
> to
> get it working somewhat top notch. So what I was wondering is Restore
> doesn't
> actually restore your computer to previous point but basically is an
> uninstall program that dopesn't seem to get EVERYTHING back to the way it
> was
> at that particulat point in time correct? Do I have to reinstall all the
> drivers I downloaded and never update windows via the automating update
> prcess again? Oh, and don't even get me started on the random shutdowns
> and
> crashes for absolutely no reason even while the comp is perfectly idle.

This is my recommendation for keeping a system running well. First use a
drive imaging program - currently I'm using Acronis True Image Home, version
10; the Business and Ultimate versions of Vista come with Complete PC
backup which is drive imaging, though not as feature rich as ATI.

Regularly image the system. Keep several iterations of images (to do this
with Complete PC Backup you need multiple backup media). Image the system
before making any changes such as windows updates, software
installs/uninstalls and hardware changes. It's particularly important to
archive an image of the system when things are running well.

System restore has it's place and can revert the system to a previous state
in terms of system files, but nothing is perfect, and it's hard to say what
is going on with your system.

When installing updates from windows update, I only do one update at a time,
and test in between. I prefer to let Windows Update scan for updates but
download the individual update files, and execute the update manually rather
than do it through windows update. This is possible for many of the
updates. For a few I just let windows update do the install, like Defender
signature updates and the update to the IE and Outlook 2007 phishing
filters. But any other updates to system components I install offline where
possible.

Your last sentence which states you have random shutdowns and crashes,
indicates there is an underlying problem. What that problem is I don't
know. Drivers? The combination of hardware and drivers? The software and
the combination of software and hardware?

On this system Vista Ultimate has been very stable since installed last
November. I have had several crashes with Explorer when trying to mount and
then explore an image created in Acronis True Image, but that is the only
problem I've had, and it's related to one particular software. I don't need
to do that to restore images or to restore individual files, so it's not a
major inconvenience.

As long as you have those underlying problems that are causing the "random
shutdowns and crashes", it's hard to say what will cause problems in the
future.

--
Rock [MS-MVP User/Shell]