Press Windows R, type regedit, hit enter. To add the entry to the Registry do the following. The update problems should be sorted out by that time, and if they have not been it is still possible to disable automatic updates. This key prevents the installation for twelve months. The easiest way to block the automatic download and installation of both Windows XP Service Pack 3 and Windows Vista Service Pack 1 is a Registry key that has to be added to the Registry. Several users encounter problems and issues during and after installation of the two new Windows service packs that Microsoft released earlier this year.īoth service packs will be automatically downloaded later this year to computers that have automatic updates enabled, which could prove disastrous for companies who cannot afford that they computers stop working after the update.Ī solution is to disable automatic updates, but that's probably not a preferred solution by many as well as it interferes with regular patches. I never liked Windows Update and prefer to download the patches, which includes the Service Pack 3, as a direct download so that I can burn it once on a CD or DVD and distribute it to every computer that needs the update. Information about the procedure are available here on this overview page. You can also order Windows XP Service Pack 3 DVDs from Microsoft. Network administrators may want to check out the Windows XP Service Pack 3 Network Installation Package that Microsoft made available, which allows the updating of multiple computers on a network. You need to burn the ISO images to CD or DVD first, or mount them, while you can execute the executable files directly on the PC that requires updating. There should not be a problem however to distribute the executable version of the service pack to multiple computers as well as long as they are all using the same language version.

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