What are you doing this weekend? How about watching your PC continually reboot? That's what some aggravated Windows XP users have been doing Friday after installing the XP SP3 as reported by PC Magazine. OK, Microsoft is this a feature or a bug?
"At this point, I want to clarify that the endless rebooting is not at all related to SP3 per se," Jesper Johansson, a former program manager for security policy at Microsoft who now runs a Windows-related blog, wrote. "The problem is that with some configurations, SP3 causes the computer to crash during boot, and Windows XP, by default, is set up to automatically reboot when it crashes. That is why you end up in the endless rebooting scenario."
So if understand Mr. Johansson correctly, it is not Windows XP SP3, it is the way your computer is configured, even if it worked perfectly well under Windows XP before the update! How nice.
If you haven't yet upgraded, you might want to wait. Unless you like this sort of fun.
Microsoft was scheduled to release the XP SP3 download on April 29, but a "compatibility issue" delayed it until May 7. Mention of the reboot problem first popped up on the Microsoft forums on April 23, prompting some to speculate that the poster's problem was due to an outdated version of SP3, but users who installed the final version soon reported the same issue.
"Microsoft is aware of these issues and we are investigating them further," according to a spokeswoman. "We will keep customers informed with our progress. Any customer who experiences a problem with Windows XP SP3 installation should contact Microsoft Customer Support Services." Seems at least some users on the Microsoft's own forums were aware of this issue as early as April 23, before the general release!
Meanwhile also consider that Microsoft reported this week that users who install XP SP3 will NOT be able to downgrade from Internet Explorer 7 to IE6. If websites you need to use do not work in IE7, like some on the corporate Intranet, you might want to not update.
Well at least Windows XP SP3 is NOT Vista! Anyway, here is a fix for your Windows problems.
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