Re: Windows Update URL no longer functions

First, revisit http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310353.
At the very bottom of the page there's a ' Provide feedback on this information' area. Please fill out the form and let MS know what happened to your system so that they are aware of the damage done by Guided Help.

If you can or can not do that, please contact Microsoft: http://support.microsoft.com/gethelp/default.aspx?content=gp;en-us;contactcss

If you are in the US , use the above link to start out. Then put a mark next to " I use it for my own personal use ", click the Next button.
IF you are not in the US, toward the top right corner of the browser window is a " Change " link. Click that and set the location.

They *should* provide you no-charge support for the issue caused by using Guided Help.
If they try not to, please let me know. I'll do some major shin kicking, promise.

In the meantime, can you boot the system to Safe Mode and use a restore point to roll the system back to just before Guided Help was run ?
SM may load faster than normal Windows mode.

And ... I will no longer recommend that Users run any Guided Help on MSKBs unless they resolve the issue on your system that was caused by Guided Help.



MowGreen
===============
*-343-* FDNY
Never Forgotten
===============

banthecheck.com
"Security updates should *not* have *non-security content* prechecked"

msorens wrote:

I attempted to do the clean-boot/WU reset as you had outlined. Though I am familiar with msconfig I decided to try the Guided Help as you suggested. After the guide had just about finished there was a pop-up saying I was not logged in as an administrator (but I was) so it could not save the changes. Nevertheless, it commenced a reboot. Something this Guided Help did caused a major problem. Upon reboot, I got a standard login screen; entered my credentials, and got my standard background--but no desktop icons or task bar. I rebooted another 2 or 3 times until finally it booted correctly. I ran the system fine for a couple days; everything was normal. I then rebooted again and observed the same issue. The system basically comes up except that Windows Explorer took 15 minutes to finish what it was doing. During that interval (with no icons and no task bar) the only thing I could do was bring up Task Manager (ctrl-shift-esc). I saw that explorer was in the list of running tasks. The disk was not spinning, the CPU was essentially idle. I did a create task and could bring up msconfig immediately; it showed settings were set for normal boot. I tried to bring up System Restore from the button in msconfig but System Restore did not start until about 10 minutes later when Windows Explorer finally finished its work. I have yet to try a System Restore but I will do that next unless you have some ideas what might have happened here.


"MowGreen" wrote:


Some 'thing' is interfering with the proper installation of the update components of MU. That interference may be why the system will only access a blank page when invoking the Windows Update shortcut [wupdmgr.exe] from the Start menu.

All I can suggest you try at this point, besides uninstalling WinPatrol/Spybot and then rebuilding the winsock stack, is to Clean boot the system and then reset Windows Update's components via a Microsoft Fixit:

How to configure Windows XP to start in a "clean boot" state
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/310353

How do I reset Windows Update components?
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/971058

There's a Guided Help section if KB310353 that you can follow to boot the system to a Clean boot state. Do the Clean boot *first*
For the WU reset page, suggest you download MicrosoftFixit50202.msi and *save* it by clicking the Fixit button. Choose "Save" rather then 'Run'.

Close all open programs and browsers. While connected to the internet, run MicrosoftFixit50202.msi and choose the Aggressive option.
This will rename *all* of the entire folder hierarchy of the update directory, WINDOWS\Software Distribution, and install the most current release of the Windows Update Agent.

Restart the system while *still* in the Clean boot state and see if the shortcut to WU on the Start Menu functions properly now.
If it does, try opting into MU once more.

MowGreen
===============
*-343-* FDNY
Never Forgotten
===============

banthecheck.com
"Security updates should *not* have *non-security content* prechecked"



msorens wrote:


I reregistered the jscript.dll as you suggested; no improvement.

I then attempted to upgrade from Windows Update to Microsoft Update, as discussed earlier. The first attempt said needed an ActiveX control re-enabled (since I had done the IE7 reset earlier). It did not say which one but scanning the list pointed me towards MUWebControlClass. That seemed to do it. I restarted the browser and again attempted the upgrade. It complained "Files required to use Microsoft Update are no longer registered or installed on your computer". I chose the recommended action of letting the system install or reregister them. It indicated some progress then... a blank page again. I closed the browser and re-opened with the Windows Update shortcut again, with the familiar result: a blank page. Manually re-entering the correct URL still takes me to Windows Update with a prompt to upgrade to Microsoft update.

Also you had mentioned WinPatrol and Spybot: I did disable WinPatrol before this attempt. I do not use the Spybot SDHelper. I have used the Immunize option in the past but it is not a memory-resident utility so not sure what you mean by disabling it. My impression is that it makes a lot of neutralizing entries in the hosts file; not sure what else it might do...


"MowGreen" wrote:



You're mowst welcome. Suggest you attempt to reregister the javascript dll from a Command Prompt and then see if the WU page is still blank.
Open a Command Prompt with IE closed, type in the below and press Enter
after each command

regsvr32 jscript.dll
exit

Did that fix the blank page issue ?


MowGreen
===============
*-343-* FDNY
Never Forgotten
===============



msorens wrote:



[MS] My replies interspersed below. ** Thanks again for all the time and assistance!

"MowGreen" wrote:




(1) From IE > Tools > Windows Update, I get the same blank page with "Done in the status bar.

See if the browser is actually 'on' Windows Update by clicking View > Source. Is the page's code showing now ?



[MS] It may be a javascript issue of some sort. I have pasted the source of the "blank" page below. I suspect the redirect.js is not doing what it is supposed to. Two things to say about that:
--On this particular machine I see JavaScript errors more often than on my other machine (i.e. loading a page on this machine produces a JS error while loading it on my other machine does not).
--Other JS errors manifest by saying "Done with errors". For the Windows Update page, however, it just says "Done" which is why I never thought about possible JS problems before.
=================================================
NB: To avoid any rendering issues I have replace angle brackets with square brackets.

[HTML]
[HEAD]
[META HTTP-EQUIV="PICS-Label" CONTENT='(PICS-1.1 "http://www.rsac.org/ratingsv01.html"; l comment "RSACi North America Server" by "inet@xxxxxxxxxxxxx" r (n 0 s 0 v 0 l 0))']
[META name="description" content="The Microsoft Windows Update Consumer site provides critical updates, security fixes, software downloads, and Microsoft Windows Hardware Quality Lab (WHQL) device drivers for your Windows operating system and Internet Explorer browser."]
[META name="keywords" content="windows update consumer site, update, updates, hotfix, QFE, patch, patches, fix, fixes, features, Microsoft, TechNet, download, downloads, service, services, software, service pack, service packs, windows 2000, win2k, windows 98, 95, ME, Millennium, Internet, Internet Explorer, support, network, administrator, technology, tech, Security, Security Bulletin, security vulnerability, critical, critical updates, security update, outlook, Outlook Express, Windows NT 4.0, windowsnt, windows nt , interoperability, vulnerability, technical, y2k, year2000, year 2000, resource guide, maintenance, planning, exchange, maintain, networking, migration, resource kit, support, help, dialup, migration, windows media player"]
[TITLE]Microsoft Windows Update[/TITLE]
[script Language="javascript"]
var curSite = 3;
[/script]
[script Language="javascript" Src="redirect.js"][/script]
[/HEAD]
[NOFRAMES]You have tried to visit Windows Update with a browser that does not support Frames or ActiveX® technology. To learn more about browsers that do support these technologies, please visit the [A HREF="http://microsoft.com/windows/ie"][B]Microsoft[/b][/a] Web site.[/NOFRAMES]
[NOSCRIPT]
[FONT FACE="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" SIZE="3"]
[p]
[FONT color=#000080 face="" size=5]Windows Update[/FONT] is the online extension of Windows that helps you get the most out of your computer.
[/p]
[p]
Windows Update uses ActiveX Controls and active scripting to display content correctly and to determine which updates apply to your computer.
[br]
[A href="http://v4.windowsupdate.microsoft.com/en/dialog_learnabout.asp?topic=0&noscripting=true"]Tell me about active scripting and ActiveX controls[/a]
[/p]
[p][b]To view and download updates for your computer, Windows Update should be listed as a Trusted Site in Internet Explorer.[/b][/p]
[p][b]To add Windows Update to the trusted sites zone:[/b]
[ol]
[li]On the [b]Tools[/b] menu in Internet Explorer, click [b]Internet Options[/b].
[li]Click the [b]Security[/b] tab.
[li]Click the Trusted Sites icon, and then click [b]Sites..[/b].
[li]Uncheck the "require server verification" checkbox.
[li]Make sure the following URLs are listed in the Web Sites list box:
[ul]
[li]http://*.windowsupdate.microsoft.com
[li]http://*.windowsupdate.com
[/ul]
[/li]
[/ol]
[b]Note:[/b] If you need to add a URL to the Web Sites list and the [b]Add[/b] button is disabled, contact your system administrator.
[/p]
[CENTER]
[A HREF="http://www.microsoft.com/info/cpyright.htm"; target=_top][FONT color= #00319C]© 2003 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Terms of Use[/FONT][/A].[BR]
[/CENTER]
[/FONT]
[/NOSCRIPT]
[/HTML]
=================================================






This is a really odd issue since inputting the URL manually hits the site succesfully. The only thing I could possible attribute to is




--I had remnants of Trend Micro PC-Cillin that I was able to clean out using OPSWAT AppRemover. I did this back in May; this problem of the Windows Update web site not working though dates from before that.

Which release of the Windows Update Agent is installed ? Check these files in WINDOWS\system32

wuapi.dll
wups.dll
wuauclt.exe
wupdmgr.exe
wuweb.dll

Right click each of them, choose Properties, and then click the Version tab. The latest Version of the WUA is 7.2.6001.788. wupdmgr.exe should be at Version 5.4.2600.0


[MS] The listed files all report the version numbers you have indicated.






(I had attempted to upgrade to Microsoft Update some months back, but I had some issue with it. I don't recall the error message but a web search had indicated I needed to reregister some components if I remember right. I did not take that any further at that time.

That's where the issue may be stemming from. Suggest you attempt to opt into Microsoft Update again. If the reregister updating components message appears again, suggest you temporarily disable WinPatrol first to see if that's what causing the software controls to not register properly. If the Immunize or SDHelper options of Spybot are being used, temp disable them, too.


[MS] Have not been able to try this yet; should be able to get to it by the end of this week.





MowGreen
===============
*-343-* FDNY
Never Forgotten
===============


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