You wrote "The side effects from enabling the FixIt workaround are minor, Microsoft officials said." Hmm. Do you know what they are? And where does one find the remedy?

Your second post should have been the first one to get the best help. No problem, now the picture is clearer. Tell us what you have done, if anything, to resolve your issues. Windows 7 is quite good at fixing itself so let's start there and have you report back what happens. click Start click Control panel You should see a heading 'System and Security', click the bottom link to 'Find and fix a problem. At the bottom of the next page is the option to 'Fix problems with Windows updates, click that. The next window says 'Next' so foloow along to have the test completed. What program/s are you using for anti virus and anti malware?

While it's a good idea not to run windows with administrator rights while browsing the web because it just makes it easier for malware to secretly dowload and install, unfortunately, I believe running as a limited user will not permit some windows updates to install. So when you tried to install windows updates, was it as administrator or limited user? Below is a support page from Microsoft. You also may want to make sure you are virus free. There are many online scans available that you can run without going through the bother of installing as evidenced by this article: http://blogs.computerworld.com/battling_antivirus_programs Also, you may want to run an online scan at secunia to see if you have all patches needed for installed applications: http://secunia.com/vulnerability_scanning/online/ Here is a link that might be useful: Microsoft support page regarding updates not installing

If you want you can go to update.microsoft.com and on the left there will probably be a link to review your updates history. There it will show updates and their success's or failures. They sometimes will have fix-it notes for failed updates. first page of mine... Windows Defender Definition Update for Windows Defender - KB915597 (Definition 1.23.4365.0) Friday, November 30, 2007 Other Source Windows Defender Definition Update for Windows Defender - KB915597 (Definition 1.23.4310.0) Tuesday, November 27, 2007 Automatic Updates Windows XP Security Update for Microsoft .NET Framework, Version 1.1 Service Pack 1 (KB928366) Tuesday, November 27, 2007 Automatic Updates Windows XP Update for .NET Framework 3.0: x86 (KB932471) Monday, November 26, 2007 Microsoft Update Windows XP Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1 Service Pack 1 Monday, November 26, 2007 Microsoft Update Windows XP Update for Windows XP (KB934238) Monday, November 26, 2007 Automatic Updates Windows XP Security Update for Microsoft XML Core Services 6.0 and Microsoft XML Core Services 6.0 Service Pack 1 (KB933579) Monday, November 26, 2007 Automatic Updates Windows XP February 2007 CardSpace Update for Windows XP (KB925720) Monday, November 26, 2007 Automatic Updates Windows XP Update for Windows Media Format 11 SDK for Windows XP (KB929399) Monday, November 26, 2007 Automatic Updates Windows XP Update for Windows Media Player 11 for Windows XP (KB939683) Monday, November 26, 2007 Automatic Updates Here is a link that might be useful: update.microsoft.com