Microsoft and XP SP3 – why oh why are there problems?

Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Monday, 12 May 2008 19:42

Opinion and Analysis

Before XP SP3 became available, I advised users who wanted to install it to wait at least a few weeks, just to see what the fallout would be, especially after the debacle that was the release of Vista SP1.

And so it has come to pass – while many report no problems at all, persistent reports of SP3 problems have arisen.

There are likely many reasons, perhaps even some ‘unique’ reasons, why SP3 is failing on some machines.

But the most obvious reason is that Microsoft’s tests were not thorough enough. The world’s biggest and most profitable software company needs to do even more tests before releasing ANY software, and put customers before release schedules first.

That’s because there’s little worse than an “update” than makes things worse and turns into an “offdate” or a “downdate” requiring wasted time to repair the system back to its earlier, working state.

Look, it is fair to say that there will always be people having problems no matter how thoroughly things were tested beforehand, especially with the millions of different PC configurations out there.

It’s even fair to point out that Apple, with far fewer configurations to worry about, has also had problems with its latest Mac OS X 10.5 and its updates.

But you really would think that Microsoft would be taking extra special care, extra special precautions, and doing an extra special amount of testing to try and eliminate all possible problems before unleashing an update onto the world.

Microsoft... you need to redouble your efforts in software. It’s your bread and butter, and users hate being stuffed around. I don’t think there’s been a time when users have ever had more problems with Microsoft software and updates than now.

That’s bad. Really bad – and instead of filling people with joy and happiness with every new update, it’s filling them with dread, instead.

Microsoft, your next big test is with Windows 7. Sure, you can update SP1 and SP3 in the meantime to fix remaining problems and smooth the installation processes for anyone yet to update to either system.

But please don’t put us through the same wringer when Windows 7 rolls around. It’s not fair to users, especially in the 21st century where, by now, technology really should ‘just work’.

In Microsoft’s world, we still have a long way to go before that’s truly the case. I just hope we don’t have for the Windows 8 era in, say, 2015, to arrive first!