PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Off-Topic Fun-Fun-Fun Microsoft Update Gone Bad

Weather aside, any time I see a thread concerning Windows updates I have to chime in with comments. These are general, not directed at anybody.

1. The single best thing to do with these issues is to let MS reinstall Windows like Jim did. Forget about trying to diagnose the problem, just back up your stuff and reinstall, that wipes out any "helpful" tweaks you may have done or possibly someone else did you didn't know about. Ever seen recommendations on this forum to use Biab's Return To Factory Settings to solve weird problems? Same thing.

2. I do not mess with my system at all. I know some love to try to uninstall or disable Edge for example, I don't care just leave it alone. If a piece of software is having a problem with Windows and their tech support tells me the easy fix is to simply go into the Registry and do something, that's it for that software as far as I'm concerned. I'm not going there. For over 20 years I've never "tweaked" my system. I leave it exactly how Mother Micrusoft likes it and I've never had any serious update issues.

There is one small thing others have reported. Audio settings. Sometimes an update will shut off my audio, I'll see in the system tray the audio has been muted and I know I didn't do it and occasionally someone will say their power management settings changed although I've never seen that.

The only serious issue I've ever had was not the sort of update we're talking about here it was the "update" from Win 7 to 10. I kept getting hangup's with the system totally freezing up and finally did some searches and found out Avast can cause it and I was using Avast at the time. I tried disabling it and no go, I had to completely uninstall it and then 10 installed. After that I use Windows Security, formerly Defender. It's basically as good as any other AV out there.

3. Many times if a discussion about really bad update failures gets down to technical details the person will give away the fact they're a big time tweaker. They think they're "optimizing" or "helping" their system. They think they know better than MS. They don't.

4. Age of the system. Computers are not an appliance or some piece of lawn care equipment that can last 10-20 years. If somebody's system is that old and they're having these update problems, it's time to update the hardware. Just one example of many I could give is the power supply. They fail all the time but it's usually not an obvious on/off thing. A failing power supply can do random things that interferes with the entire system including booting problems. Same with memory, same with mobo components. I usually replace my system every 5 or 6 years max.

Anyway, what does all this boil down to if you're having this level of major issues because of an update?

Reinstall Windows or buy a new system. To me the test to see if it's a hardware issue is the reinstall. If it won't reinstall or it does reinstall but you're still having problems then it's a hardware issue and it's best to junk it and buy a new one. Unless it's a newer system, in that case it may be worth it to let a pro check it out.

Bob