No Windows Updates Install, Ever, Including SP2

Hi. I am totally new to the forum. I have searched all over for an answer to my problem but none of the answers seem to apply to me.

Problem: Windows Updates will not install. But I get no errors.

I have a Dell P4 with Windows XP home edition. It is about a year old.

Apparently NONE of the automatic updates have ever installed.

I do not have Service Pack 2, it will not install.

When I run it from the Microsoft Updates the green bar goes all the way across, but then it says it could not be installed. It shows 1 file but then says 1 file failed.

I get no errors.

One site suggested I go into C:\Windows\Downloaded Programs and delete the Windows Update entries. Only there aren’t any.

I do use Norton Antivirus. Someone suggested that might be the problem but it still does not work with Norton is turned off.

I have never had any issues, until today. I get a notice saying I have the Bloodhound Exploit 6 virus and Norton cannot fix it. I get that every time I open Firefox or Internet Explorer.

Please advise!

Thanks.

PS I do not really know anything about registery or how to do that stuff.

 

Thanks but did not help!

Thanks Arie I have the article you linked to.

I renamed the CatRoot2 file as it recommended. It did make a new one.

But the Service Pack 2 still failed to install

I still have never had a single Micorsoft Update of any kind since I bought this PC from Dell.

 

Hi.

I went to the sight and validated my version of Windows. It thanked me for validating.

SP2 still will not install. It runs the green bar and then says nothing installed. But still no error.

However, I was told by someone that there should be some kind of log file I can look up on my computer to see if there are errors listed.

Any idea what where that may be found?

Thanks

 

dazedandconfuse--Since you are apparently getting to the Windows Update site, this may not be a solution. But put update.microsoft.com into your Trusted Sites. (Uncheck the box "Require Server verification..." if checked.)
If you run a firewall you could try turning it off just to test if that helps. (Turn it back on after seeing the results.)
Yes, you can see details about errors in Control Panel|Adminstrative Tools|Event Viewer, but since you are not getting any error messages, there might not be anything there.
Microsoft offers free telephone support for Windows Update issues. 1-866-PCSAFETY .

 

Hi and thanks! I shall try all of that. I do have somekind of firewall through a linksys router, but neither myself or my roommate knows much about that. He set up the router when I was not here and does not really know what he did other than follow the instructions when it was set up a year ago or more.

Anyway, I did get an error out of that event area. I do not know if it is related to this but it is from today:

The IP address lease xxx.xxx.x.xxx for the Network Card with network address XXXXXXXX... has been denied by the DHCP server xxx.xxx.x.x (The DHCP Server sent a DHCPNACK message).

I see other errors on previous days that also add:

The semaphore timeout period has expired. . Your computer will continue to try and obtain an address on its own from the network address (DHCP) server.

And I see some warnings that say:

The time service has not been able to synchronize the system time for 49152 seconds because none of the time providers has been able to provide a usable time stamp. The system clock is unsynchronized

Under security I do find failed "audits" that meniton error 0xC000006E, which I will try and look up later.

Other failed audits say unknown username or password. But I do not have a password to access my user account on this computer. I do have two user accounts set up, a regular one and one for my home recording music stuff so I can have screensaver and wallpaper turned off, etc. Both accounts are listed as administrator.

Thanks again. Any help would be, well, helpful.

 

suggestions:

get the microsoft malicious software removal tool here and run it. u'r NAV is probably not updated or got bypassed by some critter.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=ad724ae0-e72d-4f54-9ab3-75b8eb148356&displaylang=en

get the full service pack download. eg - do NOT run thru windows update site. just get the whole package and install it manually. the it pro download is about 270 mbytes so ... highspeed should be used

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=049C9DBE-3B8E-4F30-8245-9E368D3CDB5A&displaylang=en

turn on auto updates during install or afterwards manually and i'd opt to immediately run update manually.

 

dazedandconfuse--Just adding on to what skeet6961 has proposed you download (though I am not sure that updating of Norton AV, a program entirely separate from Microsoft, is involved).
You should be able to download any Windows Critical Update manually (for manual installation) from this site.
http://v4.windowsupdate.microsoft.com/catalog/en/default.asp
If you are prevented from doing so, I suggest you call MS.
Regret I cannot comment on the data you provide in your Post #7. Hopefully someone else can, but if you get in touch with MS, mention it.

 

hey jim - the nav part was in reference to the bloodhound exploit and NAV being installed. pure guess work from me in that i don't know the exploit but, since win isn't updating and the infection apparently exists, the guess was that NAV didn't update or got bypassed. i'm not sure that the MS tool detects or fixes this one either.

the infection may be the reason that updates don't work but ... maybe a lookup on the bloodhound thingy is more in order.

 

Hey y'all!

I was unaware I could download and install such things as SP2 manually. I did that and it now seems I am getting updates automatically now.

At least I think I am. I installed PS2 last night. This morning when I logged in briefly to check mail before going to work I got a message I have never seen before when I went to turn the computer off.

It showed the shield icon and said Click Turn Off to install updates. When I did so it said Do not turn off your computer, it will turn off automatically. And it said it was installing 5 updates.

I assume that means my 3 A.M. Automatic Update actually ran for once, but since the PC was not on at that time it all went through when I logged in today. Is that correct?

I shall look into the other recent suggestions as well, since I am still getting the bloodhound.exploit.6 errors when I open Firefox. However, what I read about this implies these are likely false positives because of a Norton issue. Still, I would like to get rid of them.

Thanks again!

PS - Since I just put in the latest SP2 does that mean it includes all recent patches and critical updates, or should I go back and download and install all that stuff too?

 

u'r system seems fine now. i'd verify that the exploit doesnt' exist but ... system seems ok.

re: updates - sp2 has many. get them manually or auto. me? i'd go manual but ... u'r call.

just curious if u'r tcp/ip connection is off USB? ... just curious

 

Will do that tonight!

No, I do not use USB. I have a cable internet cable, but I do go through that linksys router as we have three seperate users coming off the one cable account.

I think it is odd that the updates never worked since the computer arrived from Dell. So I think that some install at the Dell factory (Norton perhaps) may have changed some registery stuff or some dll (I know nothing of such things) and it affected my ability to install from Microsoft's online sites.

I am going to try an install from the site tonight just to see if it will work now. Otherwise I will just start downloading such things and installing them manually.

 

if the system was pre-sp - like the orig xp w/ no service packs - then it may have helped to 'add' *.microsoft.com to the trusted sites list. this can affect the ability of activex controls and such.

the reason i asked about usb is that pre SP win had no proper usb drivers. used to be that after and sp1 install, u had to go to devman and 'remove' all usb stuff and then reboot to force the sp drivers to install at detection. doesn't seem that this had anything to do w/ u'r issue tho.

the fact that u got the 'install updates now' option at shutdown seems to mean that u'r autoupdates are working fine. since there are bunches of updates to xp since the sp2 install, i'd opt to go manually to the update site and choose 'custom'. reason = there are a bunch of other updates that are not considered 'critical'. if u choose to only do 'auto', u won't get these at all ... i'd opt to run 'custom' manually once in while for that reason alone.