Late last Tuesday night, GMT time, Microsoft met its self imposed deadline and has started shipping the hotly anticipated Windows Service Pack 1 for Vista. It’s mostly bug fixes and performance tweaks, but the sheer volume of ‘em is something to behold. Users are advised to download and install when prompted. Alternatively read on for an idea of some fixes covered, known issues, things to check before you install and pictures to guide you along…
Do note though, that due to the large volumes of users downloading the Pack as of today, downloading maybe a little slow today.
Quick links in this article:-
- So what improvements should the average user expect to find?
- Things to check before you install
- How do I install it?
- Known issues after install?
- The Verdict
So what improvements should the average user expect to find?
Yes, loads of fixes and improvements. But remember reliability improvements vary from PC to PC based on hardware, environment, and usage. Customers will experience varying levels of benefit. Here are some of the best:-
- SP1 addresses issues many of the most common causes of crashes and hangs in Windows Vista, as reported by Windows Error Reporting. These include issues relating to Windows Calendar, Windows Media Player, and a number of drivers included with Windows Vista.
- Improves wireless ad-hoc connection (computer-to-computer wireless connections) success rate
- Improves the success of peer-to-peer connections, such as Windows Meeting Space or Remote Assistance applications, when both PCs are behind symmetric firewalls.
- An improved SRT (Start-up Repair Tool), which is part of the Windows Recovery environment (WinRE), can now fix PCs un-bootable due to certain missing OS files.
- Improves power consumption and battery life by addressing an issue that causes a hard disk to continue spinning when it should spin down, in certain circumstances.
- Improves the speed of adding and extracting files to and from a compressed (zipped) folder.
- Significantly improves the speed of moving a directory with many files underneath.
- In specific scenarios, SP1 reduces the shutdown time by a few seconds by improving the Windows Vista utility designed to sync a mobile device.
- Improves the time to resume from standby for a certain class of USB Hubs by approximately 18%.
- Removes the delay that sometimes occurs when a user unlocks their PC.
- Improves overall media performance by reducing many glitches.
- Loads of security updates
Please feel free to share any comments or issues you may have by pressing here.*
Things to check before you install
Check these things off before you start:-
- If you are using a laptop, plug it in to the mains
- Make sure you have time to do this now, you will need about an hour or so (it’s not at all complex to do, it just takes a while
- The download is about 65 – 200 MB, so make sure your using a broadband connection
- If you have used the beta version (unlikely for a mass majority reading this) of this service pack, uninstall that before you install this.
- Windows Update will recognize PCs with known problematic drivers (Drivers: Software that controls hardware, such as printer software that works with your printer) and postpone downloading and installing Windows Vista SP1 until the PC has updated drivers or other applicable updates. Using Windows Update will help ensure you have the most trouble-free update experience possible.
How do I install it?
- Press Start >
- All Programs >
- Windows Update >
- Press ‘Check for updates‘. If updates have already been checked and are available, choose ‘install updates‘. If updates are downloading, wait for download to complete.
- Unpacking of Windows Vista SP1 will now begin. After unpacking and installing, a wizard will start.
- Once the Pack is ready to truly install, the wizard will start. On wizard press next >
- Accept the terms and conditions on the next screen by ticking the box provided and accept >
- Finally press install. Make sure you close all other open programs, i.e. Internet Explorer, Email, Messenger programs or anything else.
- The first part of the installation will now happen. When prompted, restart the machine. When the machine shuts down it will begin installing 3 updates, you don’t need to monitor this part of the installation. It says it can take any time up-to an hour – or more, so go and have a cup of tea, glass of wine, have a bath – you have the time!
- Once the computer has restarted, you will see the following message:-
Known issues after install?
- Oh dear, I have been here before with Vista! If you find that YouTube videos, or any other Flash video content does not work, or shows an error message - click here for thetechangel’s orginal fix.
- You may find that Java Scripts stop working after the update, but there is an update for Java here, at java.com
- Some Windows Vista users may encounter an issue with a small set of hardware devices that may not function properly after updating a Windows Vista PC to Windows Vista SP1 – i.e. printers, scanners, or any other hardware that may not work after install. This problem is typically corrected by simply uninstalling and reinstalling the driver or software related to the hardware.
- Microsoft has a helpful article with some links to solve other known software issues.
- Maybe do a little disk clean-up and then disk defragmentation.
The Verdict
Well worth installing. Microsoft has released an excellent service pack, which for some, is how the OS should have arrived.
Please feel free to share any comments or issues you may have below.
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