Jamie Huskisson : Hey Microsoft - can I install optional updates please?

Hey Microsoft - can I install optional updates please?

Posted on February 18th, 2007 in little things, microsoft

So I’m installing updates on an old PC of mine before handing it over to it’s new owner and I’m near the end of the 80 or so security updates since SP2 and I remember about the ‘optional’ updates Microsoft offers.

10 optional software upgrades and 1 hardware upgrade available to download. So I click the links and guess what happens:

Stupid MS
(Click here to see the full sized image)

What happened is that the link opened up inside the frame usually reserved for content, but opened up the entire website all over again. It happens in both IE6 and IE7 and since Microsoft only allows access to the site via Microsoft browsers - it’s now impossible for me to get at these updates.

Automatic updates only allow high priority updates to be downloaded.. so the new PC owner is now without Windows Media Player 11, .net framework 2.0 and whatever hardware update which happened to be on that hidden page.

There are 8 responses to this post so far

Dan wrote:

Another reason why macs are so much better…

You may want to see this if you are going to install vista..

http://my.break.com/media/view.aspx?ContentID=218084

# February 18th, 2007 at 10:48 pm
Jamie Huskisson wrote:

What a waste..

I’ll probably install Vista eventually.. but as long as I can get IE6 and IE7 running in parallels through XP I’ll leave the upgrade :)

# February 18th, 2007 at 11:46 pm
Darius wrote:

I wouldn’t install vista for a good 6 months and yea i agree a waste could ave a least given the money 2 charity instead off wasting it on a video.

# February 19th, 2007 at 10:46 am
Gordon Swaby wrote:

The reason you could not install optional updates was because you were using IE lol . Jk/s

# February 19th, 2007 at 1:32 pm
Eli Sand wrote:

I bet of those many, many required updates it was asking you to install - a few of those were patches to Internet Explorer. If you just let it apply those patches first, then come back and try to grab the optional patches this won’t happen. You may also want to ensure that if you’ve got any whacky IE plugins or odd security settings, that you at least set *.microsoft.com as a trusted site and also disable any 3rd party IE plugins you think might be causing problems (you can do that within IE btw, don’t need to uninstall anything).

# February 23rd, 2007 at 11:25 pm
Jamie Huskisson wrote:

That’s part of the problem Eli.. there’s 87 required updates to install for XP since SP2. And most of the optional updates can’t be installed until at least 5 of the required updates are installed.

This install is also as fresh as you can get.. freshly partitioned and put on, only drivers installed - no programs.

# February 24th, 2007 at 9:30 am
Eli Sand wrote:

Yep, I know the feeling :) I’ve had to do a few XP re-installs and I’m very glad I have an SP2 install disk so I don’t have to deal with *all* the updates.

# February 27th, 2007 at 3:14 am
George wrote:

disable the bitcomet plugin. If that doesn’t solve it try disabling Browser Helper Objects…

# March 10th, 2007 at 9:26 pm

Hey Microsoft - can I install optional updates please?

There are 8 responses to this post so far

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