I've had a rather annoying problem for some time now, and the obvious fix is closed to me for reasons that will become clear.
Not sure exactly how it happened, but something got screwed up with my most recent attempt at updating through microsoft update. For one reason or another an update of the .Net framework was corrupted, and now I can't get the machine to go past it. Every boot I get the message to "Install Updates?", and every attempt fails...so the message is there taunting me next time. Even worse, it seems that the problem also affected further windows updates, for any and all products. Whenever I go to Windows update site, it scans for updates and tells me that one of several services must be turned on, even though all the services in question are running.
I've tried using System restore to go to a prior configuration, but all the recent available save points return a "update failed, no changes have been made" result. I'm not sure if that means something's gone wrong with that system too, or if whatever messed things up with the .Net also messed them up inside the System Restore world. Or maybe some shared resource had it's setting fried inside the registry (or somewhere else) in the system.
Now the next obvious (if painful) answer would be to go with the mirror backup I made in December, before the problems started. There's one problem with THAT solution however: It could deprive me of watching Netflix instant movies, which we've come to enjoy a fair amount for impulse viewing. Turns out that even though the member information SAYS you can use "up to 3 computers", what it really MEANS is "you have 3 opportunities to install the software into a computer registry." I found this out the hard way, when after a prior restore I was suddenly unable to use the service.
But I don't have it on 3 computers, so we can't jsut go to a different room to watch things there. We want to have one license available for my daughter to use on her laptop when she's away at college, and we need one at home. The third was used on this computer with the restore PRIOR to the one that reveled the true meaning of "3 computers", so I had no reason to think about updating the registry part of my mirror backup when I downloaded the Netflix software. The Netflix registry entry I'm operating under is a 4th install they gave me after the sob story last time...along with a warning that they would not permit another till my subscription anniversary in January.
I posted in here about this a few months ago, and after trying a few of the suggestions I gave up. The last suggestion was to try the installer cleanup utility, but that didn't work either...no discernable effect at all.
http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/index.php/topic,232500.msg2827842/topicseen.html#msg2827842With the passage of time, I've again grown annoyed enough to try another round of possibilities..so here are a couple thoughts I've had.
1. Could I selectively restore the components of the installer system? If so, what are they? In chasing down the installer system idea, I recently tried deleting the Mother of All Installers, the msiexec.exe file. Then I selected ONLY that file from my mirror backup...and while doing that didnt fix everything, the system (and msiexec dependent installations) are working fine. With the Acronis package I use, I can choose to restore anything from the entire hard drive down to individual files and folders, but I have no idea what to choose. And, I don't want to mess up my ability to watch those Netflix movies!
2. Alternatively, could I select out the registry keys that came from Netflix, copy them, and paste into the old registry that I have safely nestled in the mirror backup?
Any other ideas or suggestions would be appreciated.
