Latest Microsoft Patches Cause Black Screen of Death (link to story fixed)

[onehandle]

Microsoft's latest round of security patches appears to be causing some PCs to seize up and display a black screen, rending the computer useless.

Prevx was alerted to the problem by users of its security software last week, Morris said. Microsoft apparently made changes to the Access Control List (ACL), a list of permissions for a logged-on user. The ACL interacts with registry keys, creating visible desktop features such as a sidebar.

However, the latest patches appear to make some changes to those registry keys. The effect is that some installed applications aren't aware of the changes and don't run properly, causing a black screen, Morris said.

Security applications seem to be particularly affected. Morris said users of other security products have also complained about the issue, even going so far as trying to reinstall the operating system to fix it. "If you've got this problem, it's massively debilitating," Morris said.

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/183335/latest_microsoft_patches_cause_black_screen_of_death.html

[havocmom]

1. Maybe Havocdad was right when he mused Bill Gates was the anti-christ

MS just keeps sucking more all the time.

[marmar]

4. No sh*t.....

And it seems like the more "enhancement" updates they send, the more MS sucks.

[Deja Q]

7. Could be H1B workers,

could be passive-aggression on the part of US workers who are worried about being given the boot...

could be American workers being compelled to train their replacements, so why do anything more than "good enough" because big corporations sell overpriced stuff and thinking "good enough" is good enough... (hint: Avoid HP...)

[Deja Q]

11. and/or other possibilities. One way or the other,

Microsoft is - in no way shape or form - a professional company.

I still feel embarrassed over defending half their issues over the last 5~10 years...

[MilesColtrane]

21. No need for shame.

The dark side is powerful.

We knew you'd come around.

[hughee99]

23. Microsoft had these sort of issues back before H1B was even a concern for most workers. n/t

[OneGrassRoot]

2. Should we stop automatic updates for now? n/t

[meegbear]

3. 404 - Page Not Found

[hobbit709]

10. Try this link

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/183335/latest_microsoft_patches_cause_black_screen_of_death.html

[cliffordu]

5. BWAHAHA AHAH AH A AHA HAH A A

The best they can do. This is the pinnacle of their grasp on the technology.


Priceless.

[greyl]

6. This is for XP, Vista, and 7.

Working link

[Greyhound]

8. And the beat goes on.

Windoze is fundamentally flawed. From disk management to memory allocation to graphics access it is a mess and always has been.

Even when they scrapped their "home grown" system and bought what became NT 4, they screwed it up and built in a whole new set of unsolvable conflicts.

[Greyhound]

9. Server hiccup.

[Deja Q]

12. VERY true - except

with Vista and the number of complete re-vamps, never mind my usual rants of other products of theirs I've used, things have taken a huge downturn.

Many possible reasons for that...

[NYC_SKP]

13. I can only say that I'm sorry for those who have to deal with these problems...

The few PCs that I still use are running XP or NT or even 98SE.

For the really important things I'm pure MAC.

Thank goodness there's MS Office for MAC.

Obligatory woman farting laptop pic:

[HopeHoops]

14. That's news? You could date that story at any time since Win 95 came out.

Back up EVERYTHING before you ever install ANY patch from M$. Auto-update is a death sentence.

[stopbush]

15. These typical stories about the problems of running MS systems

puts into perspective the rare "Macs have problems, too" threads one sees on DU from time to time.

[CatholicEdHead]

16. I lost my mouse right after the install

on both Vista Ultimate and Server 2008R2RC EE. I had to restart the Server as it was a hard freeze. A simple unplug replug fixed the mouse. I also lost my Vista Sidebar with those latest updates.

[Wapsie B]

17. It simply amazes me that Windows became the dominant OS in the world.

I don't get it.

[lpbk2713]

18. Gates' marketing strategy was a hell of a lot better than his software.

It's as simple as that. :eyes:

[MilesColtrane]

22. MS got there by unenforced antitrust laws.

The same cause root cause of the financial meltdown.

[ikri]

19. So...

Another company sells some software that uses poorly documented, unsupported or obsolete features suddenly finds that their software has been causing such severe problems in Windows that it will cause the system to seize up and they're blaming Microsoft?

This is the first time I've heard of this issue and the fact that it only seems to affect systems where users have installed Prevx software should really tell you where the blame lies.

[Cronus Protagonist]

20. Vista works for me

Best OS ever made. Stable and always works. Three computers on Vista and I have never had a single problem with 'em.