I could KILL Microsoft!

I downloaded a “critical” fixer patch from their website. It was supposed to fix a serious problem in shutting down Windows 98. Now the OS takes twice as long to shut down as it used to, and sometimes it still hangs up. In the famous phrase of Oliver Hardy, "This is another fine mess you’ve gotten me into. Can’t you do anything right?

I have a mental image of Bill Gates looking like he’s about to cry and scratching the top of his head. Thank you.

Go for it. It’d be quite cool to have a murder trial over the death of a corporation.

“Death of a Corporation”

Now there’s a Play just waiting to be written…

I don’t think so. Ken Lay and his fellow Enron big shots beat me to it.

So David,

I have come to respect you as a poster.
What are your plans as far as fixing this problem?
Is starting over with a fresh install viable?

Well, I hadn’t thought of reinstalling but it may come to that. So far I have just lived with it. Actually, most operations are so fast that I have become so spoiled that even a 20 second wait seems like forever. I probably should have kept my old 8 Mhz Tandy which seemed like a real barn burner at the time. That way I could use it now and then to keep my feet on the ground.

If you do a restart and then shut down it works. My install at home doesn’t want to shut down and I don’t bother to fix it.
Microsoft reader seems to be one of the programs that causes it to not shut down. Have you noticed any particular program that whacks it?

I remember that patch. The documentation mentions that its fix is to make your computer wait a bit longer before shutting down. That’s it. Now that’s programming for you…

I think I could stand the wait, but …

I shut down just a couple of days ago and the thing hung up and didn’t shut down for about 10 minutes. I finally pushed the RESET and upon restarting it bawled me out for not shutting down properly. That’s adding insult to injury.

Did you check to see if this is a reported problem (the new problem, that is)? All the MS patches that I’ve ever applied that had to do with power management inevitably required me to download the power management drivers from the vendor’s site to fix the fix. Usually if you search the MS site you’ll see something like “If you’re using a Dell, Compaq, IBM, Toshiba or other Intel-based computer and have had trouble shutting down after applying fix XYZ you will need to download the vendor’s driver ABC to restore this functionality.”

Better do it now man, I hear he’s got Microsoft groupies who wait for him outside his house every Thursday. You could pretend to be one of them.

Do you look under eight?