TV survives assasination attempt by Microsoft!
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At last it seems I've got a working combination of firewall and antivirus that can keep Microsoft out of my network without crippling a lowly Windows XP machine. As everyone who still has XP boxes will know, even with automatic updates switched off, every few weeks or months Microsoft will force one down the pipe which bypasses your settings, installs itself without asking and then reboots the machine. Even with an active firewall it seemed there was no way to keep them out. Far worse however than the shear rudeness of doing this was that these updates frequently corrupted the tuner drivers on my Media Center requiring days of fiddling around and often a complete reinstall to get it up running again so every 2 to 3 months Microsoft were killing my TV. Last night they were up to their tricks again and my XP machines were sat at the login screen this morning having been forcibly updated and rebooted but my Media Center is still up and running with no damage :-D :thumbsup: :cool: Here's to TV on demand and updates when I choose!
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
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At last it seems I've got a working combination of firewall and antivirus that can keep Microsoft out of my network without crippling a lowly Windows XP machine. As everyone who still has XP boxes will know, even with automatic updates switched off, every few weeks or months Microsoft will force one down the pipe which bypasses your settings, installs itself without asking and then reboots the machine. Even with an active firewall it seemed there was no way to keep them out. Far worse however than the shear rudeness of doing this was that these updates frequently corrupted the tuner drivers on my Media Center requiring days of fiddling around and often a complete reinstall to get it up running again so every 2 to 3 months Microsoft were killing my TV. Last night they were up to their tricks again and my XP machines were sat at the login screen this morning having been forcibly updated and rebooted but my Media Center is still up and running with no damage :-D :thumbsup: :cool: Here's to TV on demand and updates when I choose!
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
Don't worry, support for XP is ending soon! ^^ BTW, how about adobe flash reader update?!
My programming get away... The Blog... DirectX for WinRT/C# since 2013! Taking over the world since 1371!
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At last it seems I've got a working combination of firewall and antivirus that can keep Microsoft out of my network without crippling a lowly Windows XP machine. As everyone who still has XP boxes will know, even with automatic updates switched off, every few weeks or months Microsoft will force one down the pipe which bypasses your settings, installs itself without asking and then reboots the machine. Even with an active firewall it seemed there was no way to keep them out. Far worse however than the shear rudeness of doing this was that these updates frequently corrupted the tuner drivers on my Media Center requiring days of fiddling around and often a complete reinstall to get it up running again so every 2 to 3 months Microsoft were killing my TV. Last night they were up to their tricks again and my XP machines were sat at the login screen this morning having been forcibly updated and rebooted but my Media Center is still up and running with no damage :-D :thumbsup: :cool: Here's to TV on demand and updates when I choose!
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
Matthew Faithfull wrote:
As everyone who still has XP boxes will know, even with automatic updates switched off, every few weeks or months Microsoft will force one down the pipe which bypasses your settings, installs itself without asking and then reboots the machine.
Actually no, I don't know that. Then again I didn't just turn updates off, I disabled the automatic update service and the BITS service (and a whole bunch of other services).
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Don't worry, support for XP is ending soon! ^^ BTW, how about adobe flash reader update?!
My programming get away... The Blog... DirectX for WinRT/C# since 2013! Taking over the world since 1371!
I thought it already ended, some XP machines which were upgrades from Win98 or 2000 are already locked out of the Windows Update site for manual updates and yet the automatic ones keep coming.
Super Lloyd wrote:
how about adobe flash reader update?!
The PDF reader update doesn't even work with no firewall and when it's allowed to do it automatically :doh: . It still asks whether you want to install and then fails to do so most of the time, typical Adobe, friendly but utterly incompetant. The last one I did actually worked or said it did but frankly I can't tell the difference PDFs are still a bloated slow glitchy mess as they always were but I don't care I'm having a good day :-D
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
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Matthew Faithfull wrote:
As everyone who still has XP boxes will know, even with automatic updates switched off, every few weeks or months Microsoft will force one down the pipe which bypasses your settings, installs itself without asking and then reboots the machine.
Actually no, I don't know that. Then again I didn't just turn updates off, I disabled the automatic update service and the BITS service (and a whole bunch of other services).
I went down that road but there was sadly no combination I could find that would prevent the updates without breaking ICS and or DHCP. In the end I had to give up DCHP because the firewall that does the job breaks it intermittently anyway. That is another pain but one I can live with.
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
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At last it seems I've got a working combination of firewall and antivirus that can keep Microsoft out of my network without crippling a lowly Windows XP machine. As everyone who still has XP boxes will know, even with automatic updates switched off, every few weeks or months Microsoft will force one down the pipe which bypasses your settings, installs itself without asking and then reboots the machine. Even with an active firewall it seemed there was no way to keep them out. Far worse however than the shear rudeness of doing this was that these updates frequently corrupted the tuner drivers on my Media Center requiring days of fiddling around and often a complete reinstall to get it up running again so every 2 to 3 months Microsoft were killing my TV. Last night they were up to their tricks again and my XP machines were sat at the login screen this morning having been forcibly updated and rebooted but my Media Center is still up and running with no damage :-D :thumbsup: :cool: Here's to TV on demand and updates when I choose!
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
Don't switch automatic updates off. Set them to prompt you to download, then ignore the prompts as desired.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
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Don't switch automatic updates off. Set them to prompt you to download, then ignore the prompts as desired.
I wanna be a eunuchs developer! Pass me a bread knife!
Thanks, I have tried that and it works for 95% of updates. However every now and again as I said Microsoft force one down regardless ignoring the 'prompt before download' or 'prompt before installing' settings.
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
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I thought it already ended, some XP machines which were upgrades from Win98 or 2000 are already locked out of the Windows Update site for manual updates and yet the automatic ones keep coming.
Super Lloyd wrote:
how about adobe flash reader update?!
The PDF reader update doesn't even work with no firewall and when it's allowed to do it automatically :doh: . It still asks whether you want to install and then fails to do so most of the time, typical Adobe, friendly but utterly incompetant. The last one I did actually worked or said it did but frankly I can't tell the difference PDFs are still a bloated slow glitchy mess as they always were but I don't care I'm having a good day :-D
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
XP patch support ends in April 8, 2014. I would dare to say that it's not Microsoft forcing down patches, but possibly an Adobe product updating itself.
A guide to posting questions on CodeProject[^]
Dave Kreskowiak -
XP patch support ends in April 8, 2014. I would dare to say that it's not Microsoft forcing down patches, but possibly an Adobe product updating itself.
A guide to posting questions on CodeProject[^]
Dave KreskowiakThanks, that date's useful to know. In this case it definitely is Microsoft because it occurs even without anything Adobe installed and the machine comes back up with the nice little green tick shield shaped icon saying your machine was rebooted to complete the installation of updates. What it should have is the additional message 'and goodbye to your tuner drivers' with a waving hand symbol. Anyway it happens no more as far as I can tell and the system will soon be safely obselete and unsupported. :)
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
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Thanks, I have tried that and it works for 95% of updates. However every now and again as I said Microsoft force one down regardless ignoring the 'prompt before download' or 'prompt before installing' settings.
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
Matthew Faithfull wrote:
Thanks, I have tried that and it works for 95% of updates. However every now and again as I said Microsoft force one down regardless ignoring the 'prompt before download' or 'prompt before installing' settings.
I'm not sure what's going on with your system then, I have never seen that behavior when updates were set to "Download and notify" or just "Notify" ... and XP has been around for a long time.
Look at me still talking when there's science to do When I look out there it makes me glad I'm not you
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At last it seems I've got a working combination of firewall and antivirus that can keep Microsoft out of my network without crippling a lowly Windows XP machine. As everyone who still has XP boxes will know, even with automatic updates switched off, every few weeks or months Microsoft will force one down the pipe which bypasses your settings, installs itself without asking and then reboots the machine. Even with an active firewall it seemed there was no way to keep them out. Far worse however than the shear rudeness of doing this was that these updates frequently corrupted the tuner drivers on my Media Center requiring days of fiddling around and often a complete reinstall to get it up running again so every 2 to 3 months Microsoft were killing my TV. Last night they were up to their tricks again and my XP machines were sat at the login screen this morning having been forcibly updated and rebooted but my Media Center is still up and running with no damage :-D :thumbsup: :cool: Here's to TV on demand and updates when I choose!
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
I have seen this before. Very annoying. My XP machines are mostly off now, but I was thinking about bringing one back to do like you are. I'd be interested to know what ports/Ips you blocked that kept the updates from happening.
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I have seen this before. Very annoying. My XP machines are mostly off now, but I was thinking about bringing one back to do like you are. I'd be interested to know what ports/Ips you blocked that kept the updates from happening.
So would I to be honest, I'm far too tight to spend money on this sort of stuff so it's all put together from free bits and pieces. Clearly I'm not going to post my detailed firewall settings for the world to poke at :suss: but a certain dragon themed firewall in combination with an AVeraGe virus scanner ( only the free bits of each ) seems to finally have done the trick, along with keeping the rule table really simple, to allow all TCP traffic to and from the trusted network and politely refuse everything else. I get hit with batches of MS/DTC packets which I've trained it to block by doing so manually whenever I'm around and of course all the usual requests to probe my VNC port and other unsavoury offers. So far so good although as I said the firewall is still pretty dumb, messing up the DHCP service and generally not showing or allowing proper configuration of what it's really doing. I suspect part of the original problem was the fact that the machine will not take XP SP3, something funky with the Intel motherboard I think, so being stuck on SP2 it is off the 'normal' upgrade path when post SP3 updates are sent out.
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
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Thanks, that date's useful to know. In this case it definitely is Microsoft because it occurs even without anything Adobe installed and the machine comes back up with the nice little green tick shield shaped icon saying your machine was rebooted to complete the installation of updates. What it should have is the additional message 'and goodbye to your tuner drivers' with a waving hand symbol. Anyway it happens no more as far as I can tell and the system will soon be safely obselete and unsupported. :)
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
Hmmm...well, updates are "pushed". The client on your machine has to get them, "pull". "Download and notify" will still install critical patches, eventually, if you don't kick off the install. It's kind of like a "install mandatory after this date thing". Try turning off Automatic Updates entirely.
A guide to posting questions on CodeProject[^]
Dave Kreskowiak -
Hmmm...well, updates are "pushed". The client on your machine has to get them, "pull". "Download and notify" will still install critical patches, eventually, if you don't kick off the install. It's kind of like a "install mandatory after this date thing". Try turning off Automatic Updates entirely.
A guide to posting questions on CodeProject[^]
Dave KreskowiakDave Kreskowiak wrote:
Try turning off Automatic Updates entirely.
That was the setting on the machine when I bought it ( ex display ) and the guy warned me to keep it that way which I did. Unfortunately that only keeps the 'special' updates out if you aren't running ICS with internet options set to 'connect as needed'. Once I started using the machine as my gateway with an 'always on' connection to the internet I started getting the issue. My guess is that some special packet is being sent ( possibly one of these MS/DTC packets I'm now seeing the firewall reject ) which triggers the machine to pull the update and then auto install it. This probably involves the BITS service without which ICS doesn't want to work so I can't turn that off. The sneaky thing is that it only ever happens in the middle of the night, i.e. ~3am which means I've never caught it in progress.
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
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So would I to be honest, I'm far too tight to spend money on this sort of stuff so it's all put together from free bits and pieces. Clearly I'm not going to post my detailed firewall settings for the world to poke at :suss: but a certain dragon themed firewall in combination with an AVeraGe virus scanner ( only the free bits of each ) seems to finally have done the trick, along with keeping the rule table really simple, to allow all TCP traffic to and from the trusted network and politely refuse everything else. I get hit with batches of MS/DTC packets which I've trained it to block by doing so manually whenever I'm around and of course all the usual requests to probe my VNC port and other unsavoury offers. So far so good although as I said the firewall is still pretty dumb, messing up the DHCP service and generally not showing or allowing proper configuration of what it's really doing. I suspect part of the original problem was the fact that the machine will not take XP SP3, something funky with the Intel motherboard I think, so being stuck on SP2 it is off the 'normal' upgrade path when post SP3 updates are sent out.
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
Ah ok. I think my xp is running sp3, but that isn't the stealth update issue. I'll need to do the same thing to block mine. Really shouldn't need anything other than local access anyway. Thanks
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At last it seems I've got a working combination of firewall and antivirus that can keep Microsoft out of my network without crippling a lowly Windows XP machine. As everyone who still has XP boxes will know, even with automatic updates switched off, every few weeks or months Microsoft will force one down the pipe which bypasses your settings, installs itself without asking and then reboots the machine. Even with an active firewall it seemed there was no way to keep them out. Far worse however than the shear rudeness of doing this was that these updates frequently corrupted the tuner drivers on my Media Center requiring days of fiddling around and often a complete reinstall to get it up running again so every 2 to 3 months Microsoft were killing my TV. Last night they were up to their tricks again and my XP machines were sat at the login screen this morning having been forcibly updated and rebooted but my Media Center is still up and running with no damage :-D :thumbsup: :cool: Here's to TV on demand and updates when I choose!
"The secret of happiness is freedom, and the secret of freedom, courage." Thucydides (B.C. 460-400)
Are you sure it wasn't a bit earlier? The first Tuesday of every month is "Patch Tuesday". http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patch_Tuesday[^]
Steve Wellens