XP SP2 crashes

Mac mini. $499. It's got your genuine Unix inside and a user interface that can't be beat.

 

I had the same problem almost exactly. I think I fixed it by UnInstalling the video driver update. NVIDIA something or another. It had placed a configuration panel in the systray which hadn't been there before.

 

LOL as I read the original post by Daniel the little pop up add at the top of the page was for the Mac mini. I have to say as a Mac user since February 29th 1984 (number 12 on the waiting list for a Mac from my local store ordered the day after the Super Bowl, Can we say Deja vue all over again) I was not willing to give up my classic Mac OS but I would never go back this Unix based OS is incredible and I am even learning the command line for a few things. That is becoming less and less necessary as the GUI becomes more compleat. I still have a lot to learn about the guts of the OS but that is half the fun. The Prius and the Mac have a lot in common as do the two communities. I am taken back to the early years of making my own modem cable and Red Rider to access the Apple and Mac Boards on Comp u serve! My Mac is fun, my Prius is fun and I am learning and that is the most fun of all!

 

MS XP PS2 has too many problem(S)!
Past employer had similar problem when updated to PS2.
Also, XP manage to conferect to any hard wear(ie: monitor to scanner) and manage to freeze up the computer or wont turn on.
Someone told me before when updating to PS2 the computer crashed and lost a data.
Its Microsoft what can we do.
For me, 2 my laptop is running okay but 1 other laptop (which belong to my father) some how computer can not update to PS2.
I want new Mac so bad and I ordered ipod shuffle :mrgreen: should be here with in 3weeks :roll:

 

Since upgrading my home system to SP2 I can no longer print. I have a Canon MPC 400 and when the system boots I get an error message about a service MPServer (?) stopping. Canon have no answer, MS says the cable must be faulty :roll: I wouldnt think a service pack would break a cable.

:guns: :guns: :guns:

 

Just get a Mac. I have to suffer with PCs at work, and we get problems like yours on a regular basis, so I feel your pain. Our IT guys have told us not to install any Microsoft updates. Naturally we're plagued with adware and spyware, even though many of us hardly get on the net. I took my old tangerine iMac to work so I'd have something to use when our Dells are down. So you can easily see why I have only Macs at home. Never had problems like that with my Macs. I ordered an iPod shuffle as well.

 

There has never been ONE successful virus written for Mac OS X. I do tech support so I'm glad the word uses PC's, I'd be out of a job if everyone switched to Macs.

Bugs fly in through open Windows.

Jason Miller

 

And whos going to pay for it and all the required replacment software????

Of course, if your offering to buy me one...

 

Don't say that too loud...it sounds like a challenge. Nothing is invulnerable given enough motivation and resources.

The whole PC vs Mac debate is as bad as the political ones and just as in politics the truth usually lies somewhere between the extremes. I used Macs in a business environment for about two years and was singularly unimpressed. Mine crashed at least as often as any PC I've owned but I suspect that's because we were using MS software and I was regularly pushing the limits of both the Mac and the software.

 

I support both Macs and PCs for my job and I'd have to say that on average we have far more problems with our Macs (a mix of OS 9.2.2 and 10.x) than PCs (almost all running XP Pro, but a few antiques running Win98). I really dislike the Mac OS and I've never been seduced by the pretty form-over-function interface.

That said, we deployed SP2 on about 1500 PCs and most of the upgrades went smoothly--- I must stress 'most'. We had a few fun upgrade disasters, but nothing irreparable. For my office computers and my computers at home, I just used the release of SP2 as an excuse to do a nice, tidy clean install from a slipstreamed XP Pro SP2 disc I made.

I have had zero problems with clean installs of slipstreamed XP SP2, and I've done probably 300 or so by now. All SP2 issues that have cropped up so far have been caused by messy or already-unstable systems--- excessive spyware was a culprit in a couple cases.

Remember, most viruses and spyware/malware is targeted at Windows systems not because the Mac OS is bulletproof--- it's done because Microsoft has a 93-ish% market share and these people want to damage or annoy the largest group of users they can.

Not trying to pimp for the evil empire, just adding a perspective from the other side of the fence! Hell, I'd be happiest if Commodore hadn't gone titsup and the Amiga was still alive--- now THERE was an OS ahead of its time! We old-timer computer geeks wax nostalgic about such things.

 

In 1980's the cost of PC = $4500
In 2005 the cost of a PC thats about 10,000X faster = $750
Why the plummet in price coinciding with the explosion in hardware? Free market competition.

In 1980's the cost of OS for PC = $10
In 2005, the cost of OS for PC = $275 or so and it's still mostly based upon the 1980's OS.

Why the explosion in price while the software is really not much more than a tweak of the original OS? Can you spell M-O-N-O-P-O-L-Y?

In the last 25 years there have been numerous substantive software creations. (GUI, word processing, graphic manipulation, video manipulation, desktop publishing, Spread sheets, gaming.)
Now MS does have an entry in all those software areas above, but did they invent any one of them?

I'm sure it's true that MS has invented something remarkable for the PC, but can anyone name one? It seems to me that MS is great at using the ideas of others, and tweaking those ideas to avoid copyright problems, and then winning dominance through clever marketing.


I'm with Daniel above. If ANYONE other than MS had won that initial OS contract, we would be talking to our computers by now and the keyboard would be an anacronism. And that would only be the beginning.

Who wants to invent a killer ap knowing that MS will more than likely pilfer it somehow and then build it into Windows. It's gotta be a damper.

 

I had the same problem. There is a compatability problem with your motherboard and XP SP2. SP2 tries to use a module thats not supposed to be used improperly. I have a Alienware 51m. Its like 2 years old, so its not the newest one out. I set the computer to not restart when a error pops up(if you need help, tell me). I found out what kind of error it was and couldn't remove the object(software module), because it would majorly f up the computer. There is no solution to this error, unless your manfacturer sends you a newer motherboard, which won't happen, because the newer motherboard for my laptop won't fit in my case. So....You will have to delete partition, create partition, format, and install reinstall windows. When windows is on, turn automatic updates off, so you can manually update your computer. This is what is was doing all day thursday through friday. I was doing the procedure over and over testing out different methods and found out that the SP2 conflicts with my motherboard. I hope this helped all of you. :mrgreen:

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(prius04\";p=\"63566)</div>

I agree with most of what you say, to but imply that Windows XP is a 'tweak' of DOS is kinda funny.

It's just a shame that Linux is still not ready for prime time--- as a viable desktop replacement it has a long, long way to go.

I'm not sure where you get about $275.00 for an OS in 2005... If you have to buy windows XP, the pricing structure is close to:

$100.00 Home upgrade version
$200.00 Home 'full' version
$200.00 Pro upgrade version
$300.00 Pro 'full' version

Presumably nobody really needs the 'full' version as long as they have an older Windows disc lying around to authenticate... and surely most people have a bunch of old Win9x or Win2k cds rotting in the closet.

 

It is such a pleasure to read intelligent posts like this thread.

Now for my two cents.

Like many others I run Winders[sic] because I can get software that does what I want, but little by little the open source crowd is closing in on the Winders monopoly.

I have a two prong strategy:

I religiously backup my Winders PCs, either to an external USB or Firewire drive, or to my luxurious rack-mounted Linux file server in the garage next to our Prius. I highly recommend Acronis True Image, because it creates a sector by sector image of any PC hard drive running any PC OS. It functions much like Norton Ghost, but without the dreadful user interface that is mandatory on all Norton crap.

When I really need to do some serious computing on a desktop PC, I'll usually boot up either SuSE 9.1 or Xandros 3.0 Deluxe. For example, I might need to make a secure connection to one of my many web servers (all of which run Red Hat because it is the best server software for websites). So I can start up a little 1024 by 768 Xandros window on my bogus Winders XP box using Microsoft Virtual PC. This allows me to SSH to the desired server.

Of course it is also dead easy to make any PC dual boot with one Microsoft OS and one Linux distro.

For those considering the jump to Linux, you can just dip a toe in by using a dual boot setup.

And if you are considering a Linux distribution for desktop use, Xandros 3.0 Deluxe lets you install and use certain Winders programs directly under Linux. Most important to me is the fact that Macromedia Dreamweaver is supported, and very well too.

On my Winders boxes, I did a complete backup of each XP computer using Acronis True Image before applying SP2. I've had better luck than Daniel, perhaps because I had a backup ready?

Steve

 

snarfo,
I guess I overstated it a bit but when you compare the change in hardware to the change is software, one is truly revolutionary so by comparison, one might be tempted to call the second one a "tweak".
Wasn't the original 8088's speed around 1 megahertz, and now we are breaking 4000 megahertz? And the original RAM was 612 kb and now it's 512,000 kb and even up to 2 million kb?
And as for prices, Windows xp is now 3 years old so maybe I have my prices wrong, but I could have sworn that the last time I checked at places like Best Buy, the price was closer to $300.

I'd still like to hear from those who can cite a software invention that came out of MS, and not just an adaptation of someone's else's creation. I'm sure there is something.

 

I often read about how MS makes lousy products, how they copy instead of innovate, how they squeeze out the competition, etc., etc. Do you know why? Because it makes them money--mountains of it. They've created a system where people give them lots of money without getting much value in return.

Whose fault is it? I think it's primarily the consumers for letting themselves be taken advantage of. Why should MS change if their strategy works so well? The only way to make them change is to stop buying their stuff. If you keep financing them then you're part of the problem.

Fortunately there are good alternatives, as have been mentioned in this topic. You can make the world a better place and make your life better at the same time if you just say no.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(prius04\";p=\"63592)</div>

I do believe that the best software invention that ever came out of MS was BOB. :tongue:

http://toastytech.com/guis/bob.html