Vista - Vista 64 SP1 crashed after 24 hours of operation due to "Auto Updates"

Installed Vista 64 Home Premium SP1 OEM on Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD5, and the computer immediately began to download and install 40 updates via "auto update". These updates did not affect the operability of Vista, HOWEVER the 2nd group of "updates" (there were like 4-5) completely disabled my onboard NIC drivers and I could no longer connect to the internet. There were no updated NIC drivers on the Gigabyte website for the motherboard. I used "System Restore" but the system would not allow the NIC drivers to be reinstalled.
This is TOTALLY unacceptable when you are obligated to download "Auto-Updates" and then they require a complete reinstall of the OS to repair the damage caused by the "Update". I was forced to completely reinstall Vista 64 SP1. I allowed the first 40 updates to install, then I disabled "auto updates".
Anyone else have this problem? Unfortunately, I was unable to determine exactly which module created the problem - but I tried "uninstalling" the top five "updates" on the "installed updates" list but could not get the system to allow the NIC drivers to initialize/install....

Sorry to hear about your problem and hope you got it sorted out. I myself have had no problems with Auto Updates, I just make sure it doesn't download and install drivers. You can do this by opening:

1- Windows Update, then clicking on...
2- Change settings, and under...
3- Recommended Updates make sure the...
4- "Include recommended updates when downloading, installing, or notifying me about updates" check box is unchecked. This will prevent those recommended driver updates from automatically downloading and installing on your system. From your explanation, it sounds like that's exactly what happened - a driver got downloaded and installed.

For future reference

I'm getting a hp Pavillion dv 41120us running Vista home premimum 64bit notebook Christmas. This will be my first time with Vista and am preparing by searching these great forums.. I am concerned about all this "driver" hassles ... Should I, too, be cautious with updates or is this for guys that are "upgrading" their current rigs from xp?

I would read my post above and follow those instructions; that way you don't have to worry about drivers being automatically installed.

However, Vista *does* have the ability to roll back a driver. If it was simply a driver update, then you're golden.

Also, you can nip automatic updates in the bud by manually running Windows updates yourself - then you get to pick *beforehand* which updates to install - and you can hide those you don't want to be alerted about again.

We're pretty much saying the sameting, to a certain point, aren't we.

So, buying a new computer from bestbuy or circuit city, you would still recomend avoiding driver updates? Why is Microsoft even sending them out if I should fear their installation? Obviously I am a newbie and appreciate your understanding..

Let me explain.

I would let windows update windows only, and either choose to "manually" linstall the "hardware drivers" windows offers, or get them from for the hardware manufacture's website and manually install them myself.

Example: If my notebook had an Nvidia video card, and windows update offered those drivers, I would instead go to Nvidia's website and get the drivers there, then install them.

This implies that you understand what hardware you have, and you know you can get those drivers from the hardware manufacture, and you know how to install them.

Some customers simply don't want to deal with this and simply let windows do all the updates. It's something you have to decide on, but requires an understanding of your computer's hardware, and a willingness to manually install those items should the need arise.

"Why is Microsoft even sending them out if I should fear their installation?"

You shouldn't have to fear them, and most driver updates do no harm. Can't explain what happened to your system. At any rate, windows scans your computer for the latest components, including sorftware and hardware updates and offers to update those items if they're out of date.

In the case of Microsoft's hardware updates, sometimes the manufacture of the hardware is slightly ahead of Microsoft on their versions or their drivers offers more features then the basic driver supplied to Microsoft, So it usually better to get them through the actual hardware manufacture.

Hope that clears things up.