On Sun, 7 May 2017 09:13:32 +0100, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:

In message , Micky
writes:
On Sat, 6 May 2017 11:57:06 +0100, "J. P. Gilliver (John)"
wrote:

In message , Micky
writes:
[]
Meanwhile, it has occurred to me that just before I started haiving
this startup problem, when shutting down the previous night, it
installed 6 XP updates. Is there any chance one of them has slowed
startup, and is there a place where the Uninstall files for them is
located?

I take it you either have applied the POS hack, or hadn't used it for a

Right.

_very_ long time! Even with the POS hack, my latest seems to contain
files dated 2016-6-17, and is (you'll almost certainly have to (Tools,
Folder Options, View) change Hidden files and folders to Show to see
these folders) C:\Windows\$NtUninstallKB3164035$ (one of _many_
$NtUninstall...$ folders there); it has what looks like an uninstall
.exe in a subfolder (as do most of the few I just looked at). But
[]
But I still didn't wait. There was only one directory for the
appriate date like the one you have above. It had a txt file which
didon't contain anything valuable. And it had spuninst.exe, which I
figured would uninstall the right one (since every folder had that
same exe file)

Aye, the ones I looked at had a file called that. (I'm guessing it means
"service pack uninstall", even though they weren't service packs in the
same sense as SP1, 2, and 3. Unless someone knows otherwise.)

When you've got a good name, you stick with it.

So I ran it and it had about 8 steps.
Assessing the situation, and it told me that the update had affected
net framework 4 and ie8. I installed NF4 for a program that it turned
out wouldn't run on XP anyhow, but uninstalls scare me so I left it, I
almost never use ie8. While FF and SMonkey have gotten better, IE8
stays an 8.
Checking for space
Closing services
Something about catalogs
Doing pre-uninstall stuff.

The first 4 ran almost instantaneously, the last took a few seconds.
Then it uninstalled and it also
Did post-uninstall stuff

By this and the pre-install stuff, that's what it said. It didn't
give any details about what the stuff was. Or use the word "stuff".

Revised the registry
Something about catalogs.
Started services.

I've forgottent 1 step at most, but maybe none.

Thanks for doing the experiment and giving that description.

And it seems to have worked. Windows closed and reopened in 4
minutes. And last night I hibernated and it woke from that fine.

Glad it seems to have sorted things for you!

Thanks.

Even though I took the advice and cancelled the splash screen, I
didn't see any more. Either starting or coming out of hibernation ??

I wonder if it will offer to install the same update(s) again? LIke
an idiot, I didn't write down its number, even though I know it might
delete the relevant files. Which it did.

Fortunately I was smart enough to look in windows.log , which only
goes back a month, and had nothing about uninstalling today. That
really surprises me. But it does have about the install on 5/3, and

It disappoints me, but it doesn't surprise me (-:.

I'm an eternal optimist. It's the optimists who are depressed,
because they are repeatedly getting disappointed. The pessimists can
be happier because things go as well as or better than expected.

it says:

01:47:35:062+0300 1 193 102
{00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000} 0 0
AutomaticUpdates Success Content Install Restart Required: To
complete the installation of the following updates, the computer must
be restarted. Until this computer has been restarted, Windows cannot
search for or download new updates: - Security Update for WES09 and
POSReady 2009 (KB4015383) - April, 2017 Security and Quality Rollup
for .NET Framework 4 on WES09 and POSReady 2009 (KB4014570) -
Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer 8 for WES09 and
POSReady 2009 (KB4014661) - Security Update for Microsoft .NET
Framework 4 for WEPOS and POSReady 2009 (KB3135993) - Security Update
for Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 SP2 on Windows Server 2003 and
Windows XP x86 (KB2756918) - April, 2017 Security and Quality Rollup
for .NET Framework 2.0 SP2 on WES09 and POSReady 2009 (KB4014580)

So it looks like I uninstalled 6 different updates. That's the number
I thought there were that night, but it would be nice to be able to
uninstall one at a time. When in the first step it gave me a list
of 3 programs that would be affected, it only gave Accept or Cancel as
choices.

Useful to know it does that - says what will be affected and gives you
the option to cancel. (Though unfortunately we don't know if all the
spuninst.exes will do that. Anyone else know?)

This is my only experience, but I have the feeling it always does
that. It seems to have available the text that came with that set of
downloads and maybe from that it makes up the list (rather than from
links within the updates)

Hmm. I didn't read the list closely but I know it had 3 lines and one
was IE8, one net framework 4, and I think the other was NF 3. IOW
there was no item for NF 2, even though it's in the paragraph above.

Split by lines:
Security Update for WES09 and POSReady 2009 (KB4015383) -

== I don't know what WES09 is, but this item didn't seem to have a
line in assessment, maybe because no particular program is affected.

April, 2017 Security and Quality Rollup for .NET Framework 4 on
WES09 and POSReady 2009 (KB4014570) -
Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer 8 for WES09 and
POSReady 2009 (KB4014661) -
Security Update for Microsoft .NET Framework 4 for WEPOS and
POSReady 2009 (KB3135993) -
Security Update for Microsoft .NET Framework 3.0 SP2 on Windows
Server 2003 and Windows XP x86 (KB2756918) -
April, 2017 Security and Quality Rollup for .NET Framework 2.0 SP2
on WES09 and POSReady 2009 (KB4014580)

== Nor I think did NF 2.


"Until this computer has been restarted, Windows cannot search for or
download new updates: " That seemed to be the case but this is the
first time I've seen it in print. It seems to be part of the message
sent when system downloads are offered, but I've never seen this line.
Have you?

No, but (AFAICR) I've never actually run one of these spuninst.exe


I don't mean one would have to run the uninstall. That paragraph
looks like it is what fills the details area of the Update box,
related to the yellow shield in the systray, except its split up by
item. Just about everything in the paragraph I see when I look at the
update box except for that one sentence.

files, and I'm not sure whether I've ever looked in/at windows.log
either. (In fact - I've got Everything.exe open at the moment - I may
not have such a file; Everything's certainly not seeing one, but it may
need extra permissions or something to see it. Where's yours?)

C:\windows\$NtUninstallKB2nnnnnn$\spuninst\

The attributes for the folder one level up are HDC, hidden, directory,
and I don't remember what C is. The attributes for the one I have
written are DC, but iirc it's hidden because the one above it is.

Hmmm, there were 8 of them for 9/28/2010, but I think they were 8
groups since I thats' when the computer was sold. (It's only 6 1/2
years old, not 8 to 10. )