I haven’t turned my laptop on in a few months. Recently, when I turned it on, there appear to be 8 major updates. However, when I try to update it, it says it’s downloading and applying the updates, and then I need to reboot. During the reboot, it says step 1 of 3 completed and a % that goes up to 100, then step 2, then step 3, etc. However, at the end of step three, it says updates could not be configured correctly, and the computer will be restored to an earlier time.
This is really annoying because the step 1-3 process and the restoration takes over 15 minutes.
I’m still using Windows XP, so what I may say not exactly apply. However, the only time I’ve had an update not work was when I reformatted my computer and noticed one update kept downloading and installing over and over. The update altered autorun and my AV kept blocking it due to this. The update would say it was installed, but would download again on restart. The solution was to download the update file from Microsoft, reboot in Safe Mode, which disabled my AV, and then install the update.
You can try that solution, which unfortunately means you have to get the Kb#'s and download 8 updates. However, I don’t know if you have to install and restart them one at a time or if you can install them all at once and then restart. Hopefully, someone with more experience will come along, respond and possibly offer other solutions.
The answer here is good, but I would point out that you need to download the files from Microsoft before going to Safe Mode. Getting the KB#s is pretty easy–just pull up the updater and choose to see the updates in detail. I can’t be more specific since I don’t have Vista or Windows 7 anymore.