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Surviving
a Service Pack
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| Every time a service
pack is released we're flooded with e-mail relating tales of systems
that refused to boot, lost data, performance problems, and other
issues. Before you install the next service pack on your
workstation or server, you may want to take a minute and consider the following
practices. This article focuses on best practices for installing
a service pack on a single computer or small group of computers.
If you're deploying a service pack on a larger scale, check out
out article on Successfully Deploying
Service Packs |
| Home
> Service Pack
> Installing and
Managing Service Packs |
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Service
Pack Installation Tips |
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Don't
be an early adopter
There is very little
benefit to downloading and installing a service pack
the first day it's released, especially if you've
been keeping up with the various hotfixes. Microsoft
test service packs more rigorously than hotfixes,
but a number of service packs have been disastrous nightmares.
Ideally, you should wait 30 - 90 days to allow these
issues to be identified and reported |
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Read the
documentation
I know almost nobody reads
the drab and dry documentation that comes with every
service pack, but you should at least review it.
Especially the release notes, which list any bugs
that were discovered during testing that weren't
fixed before the release. |
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Check
for known issues
In addition to checking the
release notes for bugs that were discovered during
testing, you'll want to check Microsoft Support
Knowledge Base for bugs that have been reported after
the release. We've tried to make this process
easier for you by collecting all of the
documentation for Windows 2000/XP Service Packs into
our resource centers. Look
for any issues that affect your specific hardware or
third party applications. |
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Backup
your system
If you care about your data, don't
take shortcuts here. Perform a full backup of your
system, and if you have the time and space, create
an additional backup of just your system state and
an an Emergency Repair Disk. |
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Shut down
unnecessary services
Microsoft
recommends that you disable ALL third party
services, especially any service that accesses the
file system. This includes virus scanners, quota
managers, and scheduling programs. In
addition, you should set all Microsoft services to
manual. This includes SQL Services, Exchange
Services, and Spooler on dedicated print servers. |
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Perform
a clean reboot before installing the service pack
If you haven't rebooted your server or
workstation in a while, you'll want to restart it
before installing a service pack. This will close
any persistent errant process or memory leaks, and
allows you to check for startup errors or other
issues. It will also rebuild the systems "last
known good configuration" in the event your
service pack install fails. |
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Create
an uninstall directory
All operating system
service packs since Windows 2000 Service Pack 1
automatically prompt you to create an uninstall
directory. You should let the installation create
this directory and leave it intact even after the
service pack is up and running. If you install
programs or drivers that may not be compatible with
the Service Pack, you may need to uninstall the
Service Pack. |
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Update
the ERD
If your installation was successful,
you'll need to update your Emergency Repair Disk
for each server to make sure you can recover the
system if it becomes unstable. |
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Send
us your feedback!
If
you have any questions, comments, or suggestions
that would help us improve this page, please drop
us a line and let us know! |
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Original
publication date: October 22, 2002 |
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