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Why I May Be Installing Windows Xp Sp3 Again | ||
Discussion by tansqrx with 16 Replies.
Last Update: December 13, 2008, 12:27 am (View Latest) | Page 1 of 2 pages. | ||
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This is a sad tale of a man and his machine that would not start again. The story continues with a sorted affair between two operating systems and a battle to win the love of this man’s heart.
My problems began last weekend when I started my computer after it had been off from the previous night. Everything went normally throughout the POST but once Windows XP started I heard the dreaded clicking from the hard drive. After several reboots and a Spinrite diagnostic I gave up and called the time of death around three in the afternoon. This is not all bad because I had the drive fully backed up with no loss of data. Actually this may be an opportunity to try something new.
A few months back I purchased an MSDN subscription from Microsoft and I had access to all of the latest operating systems, including Vista. This would be an excellent time to start fresh and try out Vista at the same time. After all, Vista has been on market for well over a year and I have never had the opportunity to introduce myself. This should be fun…
EDITORS NOTE: Anywhere you see a bold statement at the beginning of a paragraph; I would appreciate help if you have a solution to this particular problem. Now, on to the story.
After I installed a new Seagate hard drive to replace the broken Western Digital (WD), I quickly dove into the Windows Vista install process. Everything went great and I was surprised at how fast and clean the process went since I had never installed Vista before. After the installation was complete and the machine rebooted for the last time, I was also impressed at the boot speed. Everything appeared to be fantastic.
I logged on for the first time and I have to say that I was impressed. Vista really does look good. My first annoyance was the start menu and no icons on the desktop. I soon remedied that problem by switching almost everything to the classic view. It took a few minutes to discover all of the new hiding places for settings but I managed as most of the control panel structure follows XP’s lead.
IE STOPS RESPONDING ALL THE TIME
And then the first problem hit me straight in the noise. Internet Explorer starts half the time and stops responding after opening the other half. On a brand new install with no programs loaded this was a real irritation. Of course when this happens, you can’t just close the window, it takes a minute for it to respond and then ask if it should be restarted. In that same amount of time I could have already killed the process and opened a new window myself. Also for some reason it takes 10 seconds for the window to finally shut. It looks like this is certainly one thing they should have gotten right. I ended up downloading FireFox just to get on the Internet.
WHERE IS MY UP ARROW?
My next battle started during the mass software installation phase. To be quite honest I have my fair share of programs that I don’t always use frequently but when I need them I need them. This phase can take almost a day in itself. I noticed that of course the Windows Explorer had changed but I didn’t notice the missing up arrow or the go to parent directory button. XP has always had the back arrow but I never used it because I know where I am in the directory structure and shortcuts can break where you want to go. For instance, you follow a shortcut to My Documents and then want to go to the Users folder, just hit the up arrow. But now it is missing…
UNABLE TO KILL PROCESSES
After messing with Vista for about a day I started having application problems (besides of course IE which is still not working at this point). Apparently a few of my XP programs do not like to play nice with Vista. The main offenders are FireFox, plink (party of the Putty suite for SSH), and eMule. I have heard that power user don’t especially like Vista but before I started I chalked this up to just unfamiliarity of the operating system. After all a new operating system plays by different rules and it take some time to learn the rules. A new user, even a seasoned veteran, can get frustrated by not being able to do things as quickly as they did before. This next problem just made my head split open and a little demon pop out. I am normally a very quite person but I let out a loud verbal obscenity that all the neighbors could hear.
FireFox had stopped working so I quickly opened up Task Manager and killed the process. The problem was that the process would not die! WTF? I tried several more times with no luck. I tried to restart FireFox and it would not open because another process by the same name was already open. It is understandable that the programmers behind FireFox wouldn’t want two process open at the same time but what happens when you can’t get rid of the first one? Perhaps this was a onetime bug and I restarted the computer. It came back up and I quickly downloaded Process Explorer from SysInternals. After a few minutes, sure enough FireFox had frozen again and I went to Process Explorer this time and had the same result. I then opened an Administrator command prompt and nothing once again happened. I restarted once again and started searching the web. I still haven’t found a definitive answer but some of Microsoft’s own posts suggest that this is the way Vista works and you have to live with it.
Same song different verse. I opened plink in a command window and connected to one of my SSH servers. Now I love plink because it gets the job done and all I have to do is launch a batch file to get a fairly complication connection started. To be fair it has always been buggy and would crash under XP, sometimes very unexpectedly. I would simply start the session again and keep SSHing away. Near the end of my application reload I needed some files from the SSH server so I started the batch file and started happily downloading. After around 30 minutes, plink crapped out on me but as usually I was not surprised. I double clicked on the batch file to reestablish the connection but nothing happened. Now this is odd. I opened Task Manager (I should have learned my lesson by now shouldn’t I) and saw that plink was still running. Please refer to the above paragraph because it was like a bad dream that kept coming back. This time I had another nasty surprise; apparently the entire networking stack was also involved/crashed and I had no network connectivity. WTF! Restart the computer and repeat.
Some song different verse. I opened eMule and started downloading a few “applications.” eMule crashed and guess what? I couldn’t kill the process. After experiencing this “feature” one too many times, I think Microsoft is STUPID for making this change. Now I will have to admit that the system never crashed during any of these application crashes and the GUI remained responsive at all times, which is the ultimate goal of any operating system, but what use is this if you have to restart the entire machine just because one application has crashed? After all I am the Administrator and I should have enough brain power when to decide to kill a process. So what if I want to kill a process? I may not have a good reason. Perhaps it looked at me wrong and I shoot the little SOB. It is still my box and I demand control over my own machine, otherwise I will have to restart every 45 minutes.
CAN NOT CHANGE ATTRIBUTES FROM READ ONLY
This is another what were they thinking? Apparently all of the folders on your hard drive are set to read only. I found out about this little nugget of goodness when I attached a removable hard drive to my machine and tried to change some files on it. It is not unusual for the operating system to set the files and folders to read only but I can’t permanently change the attributes. I open the properties to change the attributes and the UAC prompt pops up. I say yes and then remove the read only attribute. I close the property window, reopen it and the !@#$ thing is still read only!
UAC
This actually isn’t a problem. I commend Microsoft on this change and I gladly accept the extra feedback from the operating system. Now only if moving or deleting items from the start menu wasn’t a protected operation…
SHUTDOWN PROGRAMS
Sometimes you have a program that needs to run right before Windows shuts down. Interestingly enough this is a common operation and Microsoft has (apparently in the past) made API hooks and calls built into Windows to allow such things to work. What I am talking about is a wiping program that will clear your recycle bin, temp folders, and Internet Explorer cache before the machine is shutdown. It just so happens that I have found a great one that works wonderfully under XP but doesn’t exactly like Vista. The problem is that when the wiping is under way just before Windows Vista logs off the user, Vista detects it as a hung program and tries to kill the process. This is of course not what you want to happen and quickly leads to a BSOD. The next time you start the machine, Vista has done you a favor and removed the application from the shutdown order, grrrrrr.
What puzzles me is that there is a well known time during shutdown that a program can request to remain open. The program will send an API command to Windows saying, yes I know you want to shut down but give me a few more moments, I will tell you when I am done. Under XP this works as expected with the wiping utility but Vista apparently ignores this request. I am happy to say that I have a wide smile on my face every time this happens and I am looking at a BSOD. Blue really does bring out the color of my eyes.
CONCLUSION
If you have made it this far then I commend you and hopefully you had a small laugh at my expense. It is always fun to laugh at others. In all honestly if you have any suggestions to the above problems that I am having please let me know. I have already given up on this install and I will be starting from scratch once I get some pressing work done. Perhaps I will take it much slower next time and isolate some of the problems. If that doesn’t work then I am going back to Windows XP and perhaps never install Vista again. I really like Vista, it is beautiful, and just a fast as XP. Apparently the down side is that Microsoft thinks every user has had half their brain removed due to a lobotomy or horrific car crash. If I decide that I want to kill a process then damn it I should be able to.
I would seriously love to continue this conversation but it is getting hard to see the screen. eMule has crashed once again and is covering up half of the Microsoft Word document that I am typing in. IE is also crashed and I can see its outline behind this window also. Have fun while I restart once again (looks at watch, yep it’s been about 45 minutes)…
My problems began last weekend when I started my computer after it had been off from the previous night. Everything went normally throughout the POST but once Windows XP started I heard the dreaded clicking from the hard drive. After several reboots and a Spinrite diagnostic I gave up and called the time of death around three in the afternoon. This is not all bad because I had the drive fully backed up with no loss of data. Actually this may be an opportunity to try something new.
A few months back I purchased an MSDN subscription from Microsoft and I had access to all of the latest operating systems, including Vista. This would be an excellent time to start fresh and try out Vista at the same time. After all, Vista has been on market for well over a year and I have never had the opportunity to introduce myself. This should be fun…
EDITORS NOTE: Anywhere you see a bold statement at the beginning of a paragraph; I would appreciate help if you have a solution to this particular problem. Now, on to the story.
After I installed a new Seagate hard drive to replace the broken Western Digital (WD), I quickly dove into the Windows Vista install process. Everything went great and I was surprised at how fast and clean the process went since I had never installed Vista before. After the installation was complete and the machine rebooted for the last time, I was also impressed at the boot speed. Everything appeared to be fantastic.
I logged on for the first time and I have to say that I was impressed. Vista really does look good. My first annoyance was the start menu and no icons on the desktop. I soon remedied that problem by switching almost everything to the classic view. It took a few minutes to discover all of the new hiding places for settings but I managed as most of the control panel structure follows XP’s lead.
IE STOPS RESPONDING ALL THE TIME
And then the first problem hit me straight in the noise. Internet Explorer starts half the time and stops responding after opening the other half. On a brand new install with no programs loaded this was a real irritation. Of course when this happens, you can’t just close the window, it takes a minute for it to respond and then ask if it should be restarted. In that same amount of time I could have already killed the process and opened a new window myself. Also for some reason it takes 10 seconds for the window to finally shut. It looks like this is certainly one thing they should have gotten right. I ended up downloading FireFox just to get on the Internet.
WHERE IS MY UP ARROW?
My next battle started during the mass software installation phase. To be quite honest I have my fair share of programs that I don’t always use frequently but when I need them I need them. This phase can take almost a day in itself. I noticed that of course the Windows Explorer had changed but I didn’t notice the missing up arrow or the go to parent directory button. XP has always had the back arrow but I never used it because I know where I am in the directory structure and shortcuts can break where you want to go. For instance, you follow a shortcut to My Documents and then want to go to the Users folder, just hit the up arrow. But now it is missing…
UNABLE TO KILL PROCESSES
After messing with Vista for about a day I started having application problems (besides of course IE which is still not working at this point). Apparently a few of my XP programs do not like to play nice with Vista. The main offenders are FireFox, plink (party of the Putty suite for SSH), and eMule. I have heard that power user don’t especially like Vista but before I started I chalked this up to just unfamiliarity of the operating system. After all a new operating system plays by different rules and it take some time to learn the rules. A new user, even a seasoned veteran, can get frustrated by not being able to do things as quickly as they did before. This next problem just made my head split open and a little demon pop out. I am normally a very quite person but I let out a loud verbal obscenity that all the neighbors could hear.
FireFox had stopped working so I quickly opened up Task Manager and killed the process. The problem was that the process would not die! WTF? I tried several more times with no luck. I tried to restart FireFox and it would not open because another process by the same name was already open. It is understandable that the programmers behind FireFox wouldn’t want two process open at the same time but what happens when you can’t get rid of the first one? Perhaps this was a onetime bug and I restarted the computer. It came back up and I quickly downloaded Process Explorer from SysInternals. After a few minutes, sure enough FireFox had frozen again and I went to Process Explorer this time and had the same result. I then opened an Administrator command prompt and nothing once again happened. I restarted once again and started searching the web. I still haven’t found a definitive answer but some of Microsoft’s own posts suggest that this is the way Vista works and you have to live with it.
Same song different verse. I opened plink in a command window and connected to one of my SSH servers. Now I love plink because it gets the job done and all I have to do is launch a batch file to get a fairly complication connection started. To be fair it has always been buggy and would crash under XP, sometimes very unexpectedly. I would simply start the session again and keep SSHing away. Near the end of my application reload I needed some files from the SSH server so I started the batch file and started happily downloading. After around 30 minutes, plink crapped out on me but as usually I was not surprised. I double clicked on the batch file to reestablish the connection but nothing happened. Now this is odd. I opened Task Manager (I should have learned my lesson by now shouldn’t I) and saw that plink was still running. Please refer to the above paragraph because it was like a bad dream that kept coming back. This time I had another nasty surprise; apparently the entire networking stack was also involved/crashed and I had no network connectivity. WTF! Restart the computer and repeat.
Some song different verse. I opened eMule and started downloading a few “applications.” eMule crashed and guess what? I couldn’t kill the process. After experiencing this “feature” one too many times, I think Microsoft is STUPID for making this change. Now I will have to admit that the system never crashed during any of these application crashes and the GUI remained responsive at all times, which is the ultimate goal of any operating system, but what use is this if you have to restart the entire machine just because one application has crashed? After all I am the Administrator and I should have enough brain power when to decide to kill a process. So what if I want to kill a process? I may not have a good reason. Perhaps it looked at me wrong and I shoot the little SOB. It is still my box and I demand control over my own machine, otherwise I will have to restart every 45 minutes.
CAN NOT CHANGE ATTRIBUTES FROM READ ONLY
This is another what were they thinking? Apparently all of the folders on your hard drive are set to read only. I found out about this little nugget of goodness when I attached a removable hard drive to my machine and tried to change some files on it. It is not unusual for the operating system to set the files and folders to read only but I can’t permanently change the attributes. I open the properties to change the attributes and the UAC prompt pops up. I say yes and then remove the read only attribute. I close the property window, reopen it and the !@#$ thing is still read only!
UAC
This actually isn’t a problem. I commend Microsoft on this change and I gladly accept the extra feedback from the operating system. Now only if moving or deleting items from the start menu wasn’t a protected operation…
SHUTDOWN PROGRAMS
Sometimes you have a program that needs to run right before Windows shuts down. Interestingly enough this is a common operation and Microsoft has (apparently in the past) made API hooks and calls built into Windows to allow such things to work. What I am talking about is a wiping program that will clear your recycle bin, temp folders, and Internet Explorer cache before the machine is shutdown. It just so happens that I have found a great one that works wonderfully under XP but doesn’t exactly like Vista. The problem is that when the wiping is under way just before Windows Vista logs off the user, Vista detects it as a hung program and tries to kill the process. This is of course not what you want to happen and quickly leads to a BSOD. The next time you start the machine, Vista has done you a favor and removed the application from the shutdown order, grrrrrr.
What puzzles me is that there is a well known time during shutdown that a program can request to remain open. The program will send an API command to Windows saying, yes I know you want to shut down but give me a few more moments, I will tell you when I am done. Under XP this works as expected with the wiping utility but Vista apparently ignores this request. I am happy to say that I have a wide smile on my face every time this happens and I am looking at a BSOD. Blue really does bring out the color of my eyes.
CONCLUSION
If you have made it this far then I commend you and hopefully you had a small laugh at my expense. It is always fun to laugh at others. In all honestly if you have any suggestions to the above problems that I am having please let me know. I have already given up on this install and I will be starting from scratch once I get some pressing work done. Perhaps I will take it much slower next time and isolate some of the problems. If that doesn’t work then I am going back to Windows XP and perhaps never install Vista again. I really like Vista, it is beautiful, and just a fast as XP. Apparently the down side is that Microsoft thinks every user has had half their brain removed due to a lobotomy or horrific car crash. If I decide that I want to kill a process then damn it I should be able to.
I would seriously love to continue this conversation but it is getting hard to see the screen. eMule has crashed once again and is covering up half of the Microsoft Word document that I am typing in. IE is also crashed and I can see its outline behind this window also. Have fun while I restart once again (looks at watch, yep it’s been about 45 minutes)…
Sun Jul 20, 2008 Reply New Discussion
I tried vista for 30 days and was quite satisfied with it. All the applications Internet Explorer, Firefox, XAMPP, Dreamweaver, Filezilla, etc, worked fine on my system. I did have a problem with a couple of applications. Cyberoam 24Online client's setup rendered the OS un-bootable after the mandatory re-boot. Somehow, the setup managed to delete/replace critical boot files. This application allows me to connect to the Internet through the LAN. I re-installed Vista and managed to workaround the problem by using a copy-paste version of the Application's Programs folder in XP.
The absence of the Up button or more importantly, the assignment of the Backspace shortcut to Back command in Windows Explorer, did annoy me. But, the new Alt + Up shortcut seems workable. Besides, the highly interactive address bar also allows to quickly move to the ancestor directories.
The bootup time of Vista is much less compared to that of XP. XP's bootup time increases quite a bit after installation of softwares which rely on services and various drivers (MS SQL server, etc). However, the effect of these softwares on Vista is minimal.
The Shutdown glitch is a cause of concern, though. If I don't manually close uTorrent prior to shuting down Vista, the process gets killed. The torrents have to be re-checked before being resumed, and this takes quite a lot of time.
I am not sure as to why you are having problems with Internet Explorer (Maybe some network problem?). Process killing through the Task Manager works fine too. You will see two firefox.exe processes in the list, if you run two instances of the browser.
The absence of the Up button or more importantly, the assignment of the Backspace shortcut to Back command in Windows Explorer, did annoy me. But, the new Alt + Up shortcut seems workable. Besides, the highly interactive address bar also allows to quickly move to the ancestor directories.
The bootup time of Vista is much less compared to that of XP. XP's bootup time increases quite a bit after installation of softwares which rely on services and various drivers (MS SQL server, etc). However, the effect of these softwares on Vista is minimal.
The Shutdown glitch is a cause of concern, though. If I don't manually close uTorrent prior to shuting down Vista, the process gets killed. The torrents have to be re-checked before being resumed, and this takes quite a lot of time.
I am not sure as to why you are having problems with Internet Explorer (Maybe some network problem?). Process killing through the Task Manager works fine too. You will see two firefox.exe processes in the list, if you run two instances of the browser.
Sun Jul 20, 2008 Reply New Discussion
the only problem with vista that I had was that it yes sometimes does have more problems with applications not responding and things being slower, other than that I to was impressed with vista.
Sun Jul 20, 2008 Reply New Discussion
QUOTE (skoricd)
the only problem with vista that I had was that it yes sometimes does have more problems with applications not responding and things being slower, other than that I to was impressed with vista.Link: view Post: 125958
Its still new, give it time =). I still use XP but i'll switch to Vista once they clear every bug.
Sun Jul 20, 2008 Reply New Discussion
Vista already has a SP1 so I guess it's more stable than it was in the beginning, but I also still use XP SP3 and don't really have problems with it.
Mon Jul 21, 2008 Reply New Discussion
Ouch ! such a buch of bad news ! I was just considering bying a brand new system ; now the systems are sold with Vista installed. So, probably my progs will also stop working !
I also saw IE progressively stopping working, the situation becoming worse each time a new Windows update occured. Maybe the explanation is the same, the XP updates moving the OS towards vista, and the apps stopping working.
I also saw IE progressively stopping working, the situation becoming worse each time a new Windows update occured. Maybe the explanation is the same, the XP updates moving the OS towards vista, and the apps stopping working.
Tue Jul 22, 2008 Reply New Discussion
Hmmm... interesting, never heard of such problems. However, I realized that my brother's system is starting to crash every sso often but I don't know is it because of SP3 or not.
As for Vista, programs rarely crash on me on the system.
xboxrulz
As for Vista, programs rarely crash on me on the system.
xboxrulz
Wed Jul 23, 2008 Reply New Discussion
It has been about a week since I have installed Vista and I have some updates and more comments. Only a few days ago it was still a toss up to whether or not I was going to reinstall Windows XP. Then I was slightly more in favor of XP. Now it is still a toss up but the advantage has gone to Vista for staying. I have become a little bit more familiar with the system and some of my personal habits have changed so it is not as dreadful as it once was.
CAN NOT CHANGE ATTRIBUTES FROM READ ONLY
I have managed to move this to the resolved category. The knowledge base article at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/326549 does a good job at describing the problem. Basically Vista and XP both set the read-only attribute on folders and I went back to a XP machine to verify this. When in the context of a folder, read-only means nothing and is only a signal to the OS that the folder customization should be shown (i.e. those annoying .ini files that makes your Pictures folder show thumbnails and not straight file listings). While the default folder behavior is the same, the default file behavior is not. Vista will by default put a read-only attribute on all files where XP did not and this is the root cause of my problem.
I tested this and found that when removing the read-only attribute from a folder, all read-only file attributes were cleared. The drive that I was having this particular problem came from my previous system so the owner of all the files was the old XP account so I also took ownership of the files. In the end the problem has been solved even though I consider it poor communication on Microsoft’s part.
Here is in-depth explanation of what I done.
1. Right click the folder in question and select properties.
2. Click the security tab.
3. Click Advanced
4. Click Edit
5. Using the permissions dialogues, set USERS and any other applicable accounts to Full Control.
6. Delete the old XP account which is a Windows SSID.
7. Uncheck “Inherit from parent…”
8. Check “Replace permissions…”
9. Acknowledge all open dialogue boxes and wait for the permissions to be set. I had an entire hard drive to set so it took a few hours.
The read-only attribute for the folders will remain but now you will at least be able to edit your files.
CAN NOT CHANGE ATTRIBUTES FROM READ ONLY
I have managed to move this to the resolved category. The knowledge base article at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/326549 does a good job at describing the problem. Basically Vista and XP both set the read-only attribute on folders and I went back to a XP machine to verify this. When in the context of a folder, read-only means nothing and is only a signal to the OS that the folder customization should be shown (i.e. those annoying .ini files that makes your Pictures folder show thumbnails and not straight file listings). While the default folder behavior is the same, the default file behavior is not. Vista will by default put a read-only attribute on all files where XP did not and this is the root cause of my problem.
I tested this and found that when removing the read-only attribute from a folder, all read-only file attributes were cleared. The drive that I was having this particular problem came from my previous system so the owner of all the files was the old XP account so I also took ownership of the files. In the end the problem has been solved even though I consider it poor communication on Microsoft’s part.
Here is in-depth explanation of what I done.
1. Right click the folder in question and select properties.
2. Click the security tab.
3. Click Advanced
4. Click Edit
5. Using the permissions dialogues, set USERS and any other applicable accounts to Full Control.
6. Delete the old XP account which is a Windows SSID.
7. Uncheck “Inherit from parent…”
8. Check “Replace permissions…”
9. Acknowledge all open dialogue boxes and wait for the permissions to be set. I had an entire hard drive to set so it took a few hours.
The read-only attribute for the folders will remain but now you will at least be able to edit your files.
Wed Jul 23, 2008 Reply New Discussion
Decryption
Why I May Be Installing Windows Xp Sp3 Again
It didn`t work with me. I have fomrmated my hard disk but I had very my encrpyted files on another one(both NTFS).
Since I`ve got my new system, I cannot access or preview them. I�ve tried for decrypte them but useless . I tried to chance the folder�s owner but it didn�t work out either.
Does any one has an idea on how to decrypte that? Or how to restore the key� is it a file I can try to recover with those programs that rebuild formated files???
The files are very very important to me!
Do you help me ?
Thank you
Best regards
-question by Mehran
Why I May Be Installing Windows Xp Sp3 Again
It didn`t work with me. I have fomrmated my hard disk but I had very my encrpyted files on another one(both NTFS).
Since I`ve got my new system, I cannot access or preview them. I�ve tried for decrypte them but useless . I tried to chance the folder�s owner but it didn�t work out either.
Does any one has an idea on how to decrypte that? Or how to restore the key� is it a file I can try to recover with those programs that rebuild formated files???
The files are very very important to me!
Do you help me ?
Thank you
Best regards
-question by Mehran
Sat Sep 13, 2008 Reply New Discussion
I tried most and like windows 2000, best vista is second on my list, xp is last due mostly to impatience... except for the liteXP version i like it alot, why dont microsoft sell a lite version for gaming
Tue Dec 2, 2008 Reply New Discussion
I tried to use Vista some time ago with my new laptop, but it was bit of a pain, I don't know why, but I just installed Windows XP back and used Vista transformation pack without the to much addons by third parties, which aren't to good.. So using XP I'm more happier, I can control it, because I know how to do it, on Vista everything what I used works, but on XP everything works to, the only disadvantage in my opinion it's DirectX10 that we can't have on XP? 
So to play newest games, you need to use Vista, what about playing those on a Virtual machine? slow?
So to play newest games, you need to use Vista, what about playing those on a Virtual machine? slow?
Tue Dec 2, 2008 Reply New Discussion
Here is my roughly 5 month update and I am still with Microsoft Vista and much happier now. It turns out that the majority of my problems were not with Vista but my firewall, Zone Alarm Free (http://www.zonealarm.com/security/en-us/zonealarm-pc-security-free-firewall.htm). The downright odd behavior with not being able to create new connections, not being able to kill hung processes, and just general system instability was all Zone Alarm. After endless Google searches (and four months) for such things as “vista unable to kill process”, “vista network stack failure”, “ and “vista network problems” I noticed that Zone Alarm was mentioned in more than one of the pages that I searched for. I finally followed a link back to the Zone Alarm forums and saw many posts that were describing problems not exactly like, but similar to my own. By this time I thought anything was worth a shot and uninstalled/restarted. When the system came back up, 95% of the problems were gone and I have been symptom free ever since. Due to the problems with not being able to kill a hung process such as Firefox or Internet Explorer I never thought that the firewall would be the problem. This goes to show you how deeply integrated a modern firewall program can be. In essence the firewall is part of the operating system and if it isn’t functioning at 100% then you will see problems. Here is one of the articles that got me on the right track (http://www.techspot.com/blog/76/zonealarm-for-windows-vista-dont-do-it/).
And there is a rundown of the original problems and the current outcome.
IE STOPS RESPONDING ALL THE TIME
In the original post I mentioned that this happened with no programs installed. I have come to realize that this was not completely true because I did have all of the basics such as antivirus and firewall loaded at the time. I will still occasionally have Internet Explorer or Firefox crash on me but this has mostly gone away with the removal of Zone Alarm. Issue closed.
WHERE IS MY UP ARROW?
I have learned to live without the up arrow for the most part but it is still annoying. I have come to like how each folder is displayed in the explorer bar and I can quickly jump up several levels. The problems stick around when there is a file dialogue displayed and you start in some very obscure part of the file structure and there is no side folder browser. This usually happens during installs where a program uses an older version of the file select API. Another problem can occur when the folder name is longer than the explorer bar width. In this case only one folder is shown and the benefit of jumping several folders at once is negated. With more Microsoft training I will eventually get used to it but I still often find myself saying, “where is that !@#$ up arrow.” Issue still open.
UNABLE TO KILL PROCESSES
As described above this was all Zone Alarm. Even more at (http://forums.zonealarm.org/zonelabs/). Issue closed.
CAN NOT CHANGE ATTRIBUTES FROM READ ONLY
After the initial install this just went away. The problem was mostly on a secondary internal hard drive that I use for backup and some applications. I went through and removed the old XP owners from the file permissions and added the new Vista users. A more detailed explanation has already been posted by me in #8 of this thread. Issue closed.
UAC
I am running UAC now but it can still be slightly annoying. It was off for several months but I turned it back on. I have learned that if I reorganize my start menu or some other task that requires hundreds of UAC acknowledgments then I will just turn it off and then back on. I also have a few regularly used programs that have to start under Administrator privileges so waiting for the extra 5 seconds it takes to display the UAC screen is the slightly annoying part. I still think it is a good idea but it should be faster. Issue still “slightly” open.
SHUTDOWN PROGRAMS
Same thing as before, Zone Alarm Free. (If you can’t tell, Zone Alarm is not ranked so highly in my book now.) Issue closed.
RAID RUNNING SLOW
I didn’t bring this up in the original article but after installing Vista the performance of my RAID controller handling my second hard drive went to you know where. When transferring data on my primary hard drive, which is SATA directly on the motherboard, I was having no problem getting 25-50 MB/sec. On the RAID card I was lucky to get 3 MB/sec. The performance was so bad that a USB 1.0 flash drive would outperform it. The card is a 3Ware 9650SE-4LPML SATA RAID 5 card with 256 MB onboard memory and a PCI Express connection. Under XP I never noticed a great difference of speed between the primary and secondary hard drives but under Vista the performance difference was scary. New drivers and a firmware flash did nothing. I eventually decided to reposition the card and remembered that I had it in a 1x PCIe slot. I moved it to one of the 16x slots (I have capability for dual video cards but only have one) and now the thing moves like it’s on rails. I’m not sure why Vista likes the 16x PCIe slot so much more than the 1x slot but it works and I am glad to have this behind me also. Issue closed.
CONCLUSION
Since that faithful day when I uninstalled Zone Alarm, the sky has turned blue (perhaps partly cloudy) the sun is shining, and the birds have been chirping in the background. My problems are now fairly run of the mill and I can’t say that I am having any more problems than under XP. I am still impressed with the boot time compared to XP and that interface is still prettier. My biggest headache was getting all of my applications converted from XP to Vista. Some made the jump just fine but others had to be completely scrapped and a new solution found. After most of the third-party problems have been isolated I will have to recommend Vista to anyone who is looking for a new computer. Zone Alarm Free is now completely forbidden on any of my computers and I may upgrade some of my other computers to Vista in the coming months.
And there is a rundown of the original problems and the current outcome.
IE STOPS RESPONDING ALL THE TIME
In the original post I mentioned that this happened with no programs installed. I have come to realize that this was not completely true because I did have all of the basics such as antivirus and firewall loaded at the time. I will still occasionally have Internet Explorer or Firefox crash on me but this has mostly gone away with the removal of Zone Alarm. Issue closed.
WHERE IS MY UP ARROW?
I have learned to live without the up arrow for the most part but it is still annoying. I have come to like how each folder is displayed in the explorer bar and I can quickly jump up several levels. The problems stick around when there is a file dialogue displayed and you start in some very obscure part of the file structure and there is no side folder browser. This usually happens during installs where a program uses an older version of the file select API. Another problem can occur when the folder name is longer than the explorer bar width. In this case only one folder is shown and the benefit of jumping several folders at once is negated. With more Microsoft training I will eventually get used to it but I still often find myself saying, “where is that !@#$ up arrow.” Issue still open.
UNABLE TO KILL PROCESSES
As described above this was all Zone Alarm. Even more at (http://forums.zonealarm.org/zonelabs/). Issue closed.
CAN NOT CHANGE ATTRIBUTES FROM READ ONLY
After the initial install this just went away. The problem was mostly on a secondary internal hard drive that I use for backup and some applications. I went through and removed the old XP owners from the file permissions and added the new Vista users. A more detailed explanation has already been posted by me in #8 of this thread. Issue closed.
UAC
I am running UAC now but it can still be slightly annoying. It was off for several months but I turned it back on. I have learned that if I reorganize my start menu or some other task that requires hundreds of UAC acknowledgments then I will just turn it off and then back on. I also have a few regularly used programs that have to start under Administrator privileges so waiting for the extra 5 seconds it takes to display the UAC screen is the slightly annoying part. I still think it is a good idea but it should be faster. Issue still “slightly” open.
SHUTDOWN PROGRAMS
Same thing as before, Zone Alarm Free. (If you can’t tell, Zone Alarm is not ranked so highly in my book now.) Issue closed.
RAID RUNNING SLOW
I didn’t bring this up in the original article but after installing Vista the performance of my RAID controller handling my second hard drive went to you know where. When transferring data on my primary hard drive, which is SATA directly on the motherboard, I was having no problem getting 25-50 MB/sec. On the RAID card I was lucky to get 3 MB/sec. The performance was so bad that a USB 1.0 flash drive would outperform it. The card is a 3Ware 9650SE-4LPML SATA RAID 5 card with 256 MB onboard memory and a PCI Express connection. Under XP I never noticed a great difference of speed between the primary and secondary hard drives but under Vista the performance difference was scary. New drivers and a firmware flash did nothing. I eventually decided to reposition the card and remembered that I had it in a 1x PCIe slot. I moved it to one of the 16x slots (I have capability for dual video cards but only have one) and now the thing moves like it’s on rails. I’m not sure why Vista likes the 16x PCIe slot so much more than the 1x slot but it works and I am glad to have this behind me also. Issue closed.
CONCLUSION
Since that faithful day when I uninstalled Zone Alarm, the sky has turned blue (perhaps partly cloudy) the sun is shining, and the birds have been chirping in the background. My problems are now fairly run of the mill and I can’t say that I am having any more problems than under XP. I am still impressed with the boot time compared to XP and that interface is still prettier. My biggest headache was getting all of my applications converted from XP to Vista. Some made the jump just fine but others had to be completely scrapped and a new solution found. After most of the third-party problems have been isolated I will have to recommend Vista to anyone who is looking for a new computer. Zone Alarm Free is now completely forbidden on any of my computers and I may upgrade some of my other computers to Vista in the coming months.
Wed Dec 10, 2008 Reply New Discussion
QUOTE (tansqrx)
UACI am running UAC now but it can still be slightly annoying. It was off for several months but I turned it back on. I have learned that if I reorganize my start menu or some other task that requires hundreds of UAC acknowledgments then I will just turn it off and then back on. I also have a few regularly used programs that have to start under Administrator privileges so waiting for the extra 5 seconds it takes to display the UAC screen is the slightly annoying part. I still think it is a good idea but it should be faster. Issue still “slightly” open.
Link: view Post: 132910
I would recommend NEVER turning off the UAC unless you have a real reason to. This is especially bad during program installation as files could copy in weird places with the UAC turned off.
Also, I don't know how ANYONE would find the UAC annoying. At most (by default Windows installation), I have only encountered 2 consecutive UAC prompts to do something, which is to delete a file in system folders. Otherwise, I have not noticed the UAC that much, which should really happen more often.
Wed Dec 10, 2008 Reply New Discussion
UAC gets really annoying when I sort my start menu. Even though I’m on Vista I still set the start menu to classic view because it is much faster for me to find things. I then sort each program into categories such as Internet, Graphics, CD, Programming, System, Microsoft Office, and so on. The folders are then always sorted by alphabetical order. This way the start menu is short and precise and I know where to look based on the type of program no matter what it.
Let’s say I install a new icon editing program that gets installed into the Programs folder under Iconsoft > Iconsoft Icon Editor. Programs usually install their shortcuts not on an account basis but on a machine basis so moving them is a protected act. Here how it plays out.
1. Move Iconsoft Icon Editor icon into the Graphics folder
2. Confirm the move (UAC icon showing continue)
3. Confirm UAC
4. Delete Iconsoft because I don’t want the 10 other links that were installed
5. Confirm the delete (UAC icon showing continue)
6. Confirm UAC
Not too bad for just one program but I have the habit of doing this only once a month and by that time I have about 10 programs to rearrange. This is not a deal breaker by any means, just annoying.
Let’s say I install a new icon editing program that gets installed into the Programs folder under Iconsoft > Iconsoft Icon Editor. Programs usually install their shortcuts not on an account basis but on a machine basis so moving them is a protected act. Here how it plays out.
1. Move Iconsoft Icon Editor icon into the Graphics folder
2. Confirm the move (UAC icon showing continue)
3. Confirm UAC
4. Delete Iconsoft because I don’t want the 10 other links that were installed
5. Confirm the delete (UAC icon showing continue)
6. Confirm UAC
Not too bad for just one program but I have the habit of doing this only once a month and by that time I have about 10 programs to rearrange. This is not a deal breaker by any means, just annoying.
Thu Dec 11, 2008 Reply New Discussion
Make sure you're running SP1 of Vista. If you don't, then UAC will be very annoying. That and the fact that file transfers were vastly improved on SP1.
I'm running Windows Server 2008 which is basically Vista with many tweakable settings and with UAC on and using a standard account, not an administrator. It works and feels like UNIX (but not UNIX) the way I like it.
xboxrulz
I'm running Windows Server 2008 which is basically Vista with many tweakable settings and with UAC on and using a standard account, not an administrator. It works and feels like UNIX (but not UNIX) the way I like it.
xboxrulz
Thu Dec 11, 2008 Reply New Discussion
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