Date: August 30, 2004
Subject: Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2 Update

In last month's bulletin our readers were advised to exercise caution when installing Windows XP Service Pack 2 as its firewall and additional security features could conflict with existing software. We have installed Service Pack 2 on several computers at ELM over the past weeks and would like to share the following findings that we hope will be of benefit to you.

Before Installing

1/ Ensure that all hardware is functioning properly and remove supporting software for hardware that does not function. Non-functioning hardware may be determined by scanning the hardware list on your system for any items flagged by an exclamation mark within a yellow triangle.

2/ A backup of critical data (documents, spreadsheets, email, contact lists, etc.) should be performed before Service Pack 2 is installed. It is very highly recommended that a full system backup be made in case the Service Pack fails to install properly.

3/ Defragment your hard drive. Service Pack 2 adds or updates about 2,500 files on average. Installation time could be significantly increased if the installation process must rewrite files that are scattered throughout the hard drive. This is especially true on portable computers where the hard drive is often 30% slower than hard drives used in desktop systems.

4/ If you have anti-virus and/or firewall software installed you may find that Service Pack 2 will not install. You can typically get around this problem by temporarily de-activating these utilities.

5/ Ensure that you have enough time for the update. If you have kept your current installation of Windows XP up-to-date as updates became available Service Pack 2 could take as little as half an hour, for a non-updated XP system the update could take as much as two hours to complete.

6/ Ensure that your internet connection is capable of downloading the Service Pack or install it from CD (supplied by Microsoft). For an XP system will all current updates installed the download size of Service Pack 2 is about 100Mb, the download size will be significantly larger for a non-updated XP system. It is not recommended that you use a dial-up connection to obtain Service Pack 2.

7/ Ensure that you have sufficient disk space for the download and for the files that will be added or updated. Following installation a new directory will be created on your hard drive containing about 400Mb of data. If there is not enough free space to hold this additional data the installation could potentially stop prematurely. You can use the Disk Cleanup tool to make as much space as possible available on your hard drive.

After Installing

1/ Ensure that you re-activate your anti-virus and/or firewall software.

2/ Window's Internet Connection Firewall is turned on by default when Service Pack 2 is installed and may interfere with internet or remote communications applications. The following steps may be taken to resolve this:

     a/ Modify the port settings for Internet Connection Firewall so that the ports your software requires are left open.

     b/ If you have a third party firewall installed on your system you can turn off Internet Connection Firewall with no ill effect.

      c/ Confirm with your software vendors that their products are compatible with Service Pack 2.

3/ Defragment your hard drive. Due to the addition or update of a large amount of data many files on your system could be scattered in various locations on your hard drive which can adversely affect system performance.