After XP SP3 Upgrade - Device Manager Empty / Network Connection Icons Missing
Now that SP3 is officially released - I can't help but think that my annoying issue has surfaced once again (it has reared its ugly head through the years) - and it may be back with a vengence. I have read artilces through the years having to do with corrupt registry entries in "HKLM\SYSTEM\CURRENTCONTROLSET\ENUM".
I was upgrading a well maintained XP PRO SP2 to SP3 on a Compaq Presario S5400NX. After the upgrade, while trying to open "My Computer" - it now takes much longer. But the real issue is that the Network Connections screen now does not show any of the NIC cards. I have three adapters that used to show up - the Onboard RealTek adapter was disabled prior to starting upgrade as was the Firewire Port. The working and enabled adpater was an INTEL MT1000/PCI. {Note however the network connection is working}. In an attempt to troubleshoot - I tried to bring up the Device Manager - and to my suprise - it is now empty.
Has anyone (beta testers/or current upgraders) had this experience? Is there a definitive fix?
Thanks and Regards,
Doug
Answers
I'll be d a m n e d - it was indeed corruption introduced into the registry by the SP3 upgrade process itself.
In my case it was located in: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum\Root\LEGACY_CCPROXY
All the invalid entries ( which for me all began with $%& ) had to be deleted.
Finding your currupted entries is not easy - but expand all sections in all controlsets with \Enum\ to find them. Posts in other forums have never produced corruption in the exact same registry tree/keys - so unfortuneatly you will have to "look hard". Also deleting the bogus entries may not be as easy as just "delete". You may need to modify the permisions on each entry.
For a small amount of entries:
1) Rightclick and go to the permissions of the corrupt registry key
2) add new permission for the administrator
3) give the administrator "full control"4) Reboot into Safe Mode (F8)
5) run regedit and delete the offending keys
For a large amount of entries I chose the following instructions:
1. Download and install SubInACL
2. Create a blank file named reset.cmd in C:\Program Files\Windows Resource
Kits\Tools folder.3. Edit the reset.cmd file with the following content.
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE /grant=administrators=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CURRENT_USER /grant=administrators=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT /grant=administrators=f
subinacl /subdirectories %SystemDrive% /grant=administrators=fsubinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE /grant=system=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CURRENT_USER /grant=system=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT /grant=system=f
subinacl /subdirectories %SystemDrive% /grant=system=f4. Enter into the CMD/Command prompt. CD Change Directory to C:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools
5. Run reset.cmd
6. After many minutes of processing by subinacl, the permission will be reset Ignore any errors.
7. Reboot into Safe Mode (F8)
8. Run regedit and delete the offending keys
These instructions were adapted from many other posters across numerous forums and sites - all credit to the original authors.
Good Luck and Regards,
Doug
9/6/08 Update: As this thread is rather long now - I wanted to bring all of your attention to the following - a "fix" which might end up being easier to implement than my early workaround listed above :
Symantec has posted their own Windows Registry cleaning tool. It is available at: ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/tutorials/SymRegFix.exe
Microsoft has also posted their own registry clean-up tool, fixccs.exe, which needs to be run in Safe Mode. See:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/953979
Regards - Doug
As an early reporter of the problem - I would like to clarify a few points:
1st - No problem is exactly the same - no fix/workaround will work for everyone - sorry.
2nd - This problem (registry corruption) was directly introduced by the SP3 upgrade procedure. NO QUESTION !
3rd - Going back to SP2 will not work. The corruption remains.
4th - Waiting for Microsoft to acknowledge or fix this serious problem is foolhearty. If you have this specific reported corruption anywhere in "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\*ControlSet*\*" - you will likely have issues with your device manager (and more). It will not be resolved until you remove those entries.
5th - Waiting for a "magic" procedure from Microsoft is not likely. Unfortuneatly, if you have this specific corruption - you will have to do the work - find the entries - and remove them - or live with the fallout - until (and if) - resolved by Microsoft.
Those that have sent me private e-mails on conspiracy theories due to the competitive nature between Symantec and Microsoft - while intersting - I will leave it as: I was not happy having to spend 16 hours researching this issue - to solve an issue introduced by the SP3 upgrade. An issue that I excpect will be widespread - and likely to be talked about on this forum for a long time.
Good luck to those in my boat - Hope my fix works for you.
Regards,
Doug
Solved for me as well, but I used a much simpler method...
(1) Write down Norton Product Key.
(2) Remove Norton products with the Norton Removal Tool found on Symantec's Website...http://service1.symantec.com/Support/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2005033108162039 (does a better job of removing registry entries)
(3) (May not be necessary) Search for the string "$%&" in regedit, delete the remaining corrupt keys (I found 2 'legacy' keys with several corrupt sub-keys)
(4) (May not be necessary) Delete the "Symantec Shared" folder from C:/Program Files/Common Files
(5) Reinstall Norton Product.
Good Luck!
-Kevin
I posted a workaround/fix all the way back on Page 1 of this thread. I will repost again. Good Luck !
MRFREEZE61 wrote:
I'll be ******** - it was indeed corruption introduced into the registry by the SP3 upgrade process itself.
In my case it was located in: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum\Root\LEGACY_CCPROXY
All the invalid entries ( which for me all began with $%& ) had to be deleted.
Finding your corrupted entries is not easy - but expand all sections in all controlsets with \Enum\ to find them. Posts in other forums have never produced corruption in the exact same registry tree/keys - so unfortuneatly you will have to "look hard". Also deleting the bogus entries may not be as easy as just "delete". You may need to modify the permisions on each entry.
For a small amount of entries:
1) Rightclick and go to the permissions of the corrupt registry key
2) add new permission for the administrator
3) give the administrator "full control"4) Reboot into Safe Mode (F8)
5) run regedit and delete the offending keys
For a large amount of entries I chose the following instructions:
1. Download and install SubInACL
2. Create a blank file named reset.cmd in C:\Program Files\Windows Resource
Kits\Tools folder.3. Edit the reset.cmd file with the following content.
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE /grant=administrators=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CURRENT_USER /grant=administrators=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT /grant=administrators=f
subinacl /subdirectories %SystemDrive% /grant=administrators=fsubinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE /grant=system=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CURRENT_USER /grant=system=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT /grant=system=f
subinacl /subdirectories %SystemDrive% /grant=system=f4. Enter into the CMD/Command prompt. CD Change Directory to C:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools
5. Run reset.cmd
6. After many minutes of processing by subinacl, the permission will be reset Ignore any errors.
7. Reboot into Safe Mode (F8)
8. Run regedit and delete the offending keys
These instructions were adapted from many other posters across numerous forums and sites - all credit to the original authors.
Good Luck and Regards,
Doug
Symantec have now posted a tool for cleaning up the Windows Registry after the mess left behind caused by a conflict between SP3 and Norton products. It is available at: ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/tutorials/SymRegFix.exe
See rdhw's post for further details:
http://forums.microsoft.com/TechNet/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=3449197&SiteID=17
Symantec have posted a tool for cleaning up the Windows Registry after the mess left behind caused by a conflict between SP3 and Norton products. It is available at: ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/tutorials/SymRegFix.exe
See rdhw's post for further details (particularly his second one in the thread):
http://forums.microsoft.com/TechNet/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=3449197&SiteID=17
Microsoft have also posted their own registry clean-up tool, fixccs.exe, which needs to be run in Safe Mode. See
All Replies
My laptop is Compaq Presario B2805 and XP Pro Sp2.
I have the same situation, I also found this also happened on Sp3 rc2
http://forums.microsoft.com/TechNet/ShowForum.aspx?ForumID=2010&SiteID=17
And worse, no "Safely Remove Hardware Icon" when you plug anything to USB and PCMAC.
My Creative Soundblaster Audigy 2 NZ notebook is not working anymore.
And everytime when I start live messenger first time after the windows start, a software installation window pop-up.
System restore can not restore to the status before Sp3
I remove Sp3, and all the problems remain in sp2.
I'm in the same boat. I'm running an old IBM (pre Lenovo) ThinkCenter. Single 2.6 GHz Intel processor with legal versions of everything. SP2 worked well for years.
I also noticed that my Zune doesn't want to be recognized either. I installed the new Zune software before the SP3 update. After SP3, Zune is no longer recognized (it does charge so the cable isn't bad).
I lost the 'safely remove hardware' icon along with my whole empty device manager.
I have the same problem.
After installing XP from Microsoft Update my Device Manager displays nothing also Network Connections Icons disappeared. Wireless connection does not work as ThinkVantage does not see Network Connections.
System is Lenovo T60p.
Removing SP3 does not resolve this issue also system restore does not bring back settings.
Probably there is something wrong with system registry.
Please help!
I don't want to reinstall Windows once again!
It will cost me 1 day of work doing all the backups and restoring data after bringing xp back to its orginal state.
Greets,
Lucas
- I got the same problem, updated two similar computers from SP2 with all updates to SP3.
Pain......
Regards Copying from the thread http://forums.microsoft.com/TechNet/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=2906091&SiteID=17
For clarification, Do you get the issue with the following
1> Enter devmgmt.msc in Start->Run. I would like to see screenshot for the same.
2> Start->Right click My computer->Select Properties->Click hardware tab. Again screenshot will help.
Does systeminfo & msinfo32.exe shows device data? If these are not showing data, check following
1> Do you see the entry for HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WBEM\WDM in regedit and if yes, do you see a name-value pair like the following
"C:\WINDOWS\system32\DRIVERS\mssmbios.sys[MofResource]::::::::::::::: LowDateTime:-1424417792,HighDateTime:29653576***Binary mof compiled successfully".
Directory and time values may change. If it is not there. please check HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WBEM\WDM\DREDGE also and let us know what entries you see in these two sections.
If not the above, Do you see the entry for MSSMBIOS.SYS anywhere in registry? Send me the location wherever you see this key and what data is there.
2> If everything was perfect in 1, do the following
-
Enable WMI Verbose logging [http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa392285.aspx] and increse size to 6553600.
-
Run WBEMTEST from Start->Run and connect to root\cimv2.
-
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa389273(VS.85).aspx has list of "Computer System Hardware Classes" exposed by WMI with prefix WIN32_xxxxx. Can you check if you are getting data for these classes using WBEMTEST started and connected earlier? Let me know which classes you tried from this list and which gave you trouble.
-
If there is problem getting data here, send me WMI logs from the location mentioned in http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa392285.aspx after zipping them in one file.
-
Also send me msinfo32.exe output as per the following steps.
-
Start->Run->msinfo32.exe -> let it run for some time and show you the data -> File -> Save -> Give file name -> It should create a “system information file” or .nfo file in your preferred directory as you selected earlier. Send me that file.
-
Send all requested data to Atul<<dot*> Kumar <<AT^> microsoft<@#dot>> com. Remove spaces and replace tags with actual symbols.
-
- I'm having the same problem exactly. Hopefully, MS will hurry with a fix.
I have the same problem on my computer.
Please advise if anyone has a fix for this problemPlease go through the steps I have outlined in the earlier post and let me know the results. We are trying to figure out what may be broken.
I'll have more info when I get home from work. That should be 6 PM Eastern, 3 PM Pacific.
I have the exact same problem and I am more than willing to help you debug the issue. Please keep us posted and let me know if there is anything that I can do to help.
I'll be d a m n e d - it was indeed corruption introduced into the registry by the SP3 upgrade process itself.
In my case it was located in: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum\Root\LEGACY_CCPROXY
All the invalid entries ( which for me all began with $%& ) had to be deleted.
Finding your currupted entries is not easy - but expand all sections in all controlsets with \Enum\ to find them. Posts in other forums have never produced corruption in the exact same registry tree/keys - so unfortuneatly you will have to "look hard". Also deleting the bogus entries may not be as easy as just "delete". You may need to modify the permisions on each entry.
For a small amount of entries:
1) Rightclick and go to the permissions of the corrupt registry key
2) add new permission for the administrator
3) give the administrator "full control"4) Reboot into Safe Mode (F8)
5) run regedit and delete the offending keys
For a large amount of entries I chose the following instructions:
1. Download and install SubInACL
2. Create a blank file named reset.cmd in C:\Program Files\Windows Resource
Kits\Tools folder.3. Edit the reset.cmd file with the following content.
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE /grant=administrators=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CURRENT_USER /grant=administrators=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT /grant=administrators=f
subinacl /subdirectories %SystemDrive% /grant=administrators=fsubinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE /grant=system=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CURRENT_USER /grant=system=f
subinacl /subkeyreg HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT /grant=system=f
subinacl /subdirectories %SystemDrive% /grant=system=f4. Enter into the CMD/Command prompt. CD Change Directory to C:\Program Files\Windows Resource Kits\Tools
5. Run reset.cmd
6. After many minutes of processing by subinacl, the permission will be reset Ignore any errors.
7. Reboot into Safe Mode (F8)
8. Run regedit and delete the offending keys
These instructions were adapted from many other posters across numerous forums and sites - all credit to the original authors.
Good Luck and Regards,
Doug
9/6/08 Update: As this thread is rather long now - I wanted to bring all of your attention to the following - a "fix" which might end up being easier to implement than my early workaround listed above :
Symantec has posted their own Windows Registry cleaning tool. It is available at: ftp://ftp.symantec.com/public/english_us_canada/tutorials/SymRegFix.exe
Microsoft has also posted their own registry clean-up tool, fixccs.exe, which needs to be run in Safe Mode. See:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/953979
Regards - Doug
MRFREEZE61: I have found a similar corruption on my system.
I see parent keys that all seem to be Norton/Symantec product keys. These are throughout my registry and not limited to the location that you pointed out. These keys include:
LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE
Automatic LiveUpdate Scheduler
ccEvtMgr
ccSetMgr
CLTNetCnService
Instances
LiveUpdate
LiveUpdateNotice
NAVENG
NAVEX15
Symantec Core LC
Underneath EACH of these keys are over 180 corrupted keys FOR EACH ONE.
The first subkey is
$%&'(
and then every subkey thereafter adds another character for each key until you are left with the final subkey of
$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-./0123$%&'()*+,-
Unfortunately in my case this means I have almost 2000 corrupted keys which need to be manually removed.
If anyone from Microsoft has any quick way of fixing this I sure would appreciate it since SP3 is what caused this huge mess.
Thanks
MRFREEZE61: Your solution will not work in my case. When I attempt to go to safe mode, my mouse and keyboard do not seem to work so I can't acknowledge the "Windows is running in safe mode" dialog to get in. Is there any way to delete those corrupt keys without being in safe mode? A registry utility/tool perhaps?
Upon further investigation I see that even many if not most of the subkeys have similar corrupt subkeys and so on. So I'm dealing with tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of these recursive patters in the registry.
I will definitely require a tool of some sort to clean this up.
Any suggestions or recommendations are welcome.
ThanksHere's a reference to another site where the same issue is detailed:
http://www.annoyances.org/exec/forum/winxp/1203026066
My problem solved by MRFREEZE61's solution.
The problem is still here.
I spent over two hours on the phone with a MS rep who was very kind but we couldn't narrow it down.
After all the install attempts and one working, I uninstalled and the problem was still there. I removed Norton 2008, re-installed SP3, and then Norton 2008 and still empty device manager and all USB devices that aren't plugged in at boot time do not get recognized.
Slow load for "My Computer" as well.
I'll keep you posted.
- Problem description:
1. Affected: Two machines that I upgradeded, well serviced XP SP2 setups, a laptop and a desktop. I upgraded the desktop after my test case, the laptop, rebooted and everything appeared to run. The panel unfortunately was an unexpected surprise. Then the registry issues became apparent.
2. Functionality lost:
- hardware manager panel empty
- network connections panel empty
- USB safely remove missing
- USB device, scanner, non-functional, driver not accessible. That means that while the scanner is available at boot time, it is and remains unusable. The scanner software (Canon) unfortunately uses the registry.
Summary: Reduced functionality, unclear resolution time, unclear if fixable at all with tools or otherwise.
3. Registry corruption types:
MFreeze's and other's description is good:
Automatic LiveUpdate Scheduler
ccEvtMgr
ccSetMgr
etc.
contain lines starting with:
$%&'(
up to 166 lines extending the pattern under the same key.
The registry editor lists 53982 lines total with that pattern. Can't delete them all by hand!
Could someone please clarify if "&" is legal in keys and in what patterns?
4. Registry cleaners don't necessarily work, I used maxcleaner and jv16 to analyze. The issue may not even show up because the keys appear "legal".
5. Summary: This is pretty bad. Is there a good fix yet? Why is such a problem not high priority?
Turns out the suggested fix may work, but it is a broad problem.
I am worried that deleting the $%&'( alone will not fix it, but negate fixing the problem later. Has the cause been determined yet?
This appears to be a Symantec related problem according to the keys showing up: cc.., etc. Is anyone from Symantec on this yet? Since SP3 has been distributed by autoupdate to at least one of my machines: Am I to believe that this problem did not show up in testing? Really? For something as widely tested as SP3? Really? I mean seriously? And it happened to both my machines? And there is little response from MS on this thread? Really? Isn't there any concern for MS given that the suspicion could be created that just another AV vendor than MS was affected or that it could be perceived as tactics trying to migrate people from XP to Vista?
Thanks for any help, specifically from the MS or Symantec teams.
datarimlens - Same here, datarimlens.
I'm away from my computer right now but I had a few thoughts on what might help fix the issue.
A friend here at work suggested that I run the registry through a registry fixer or something like that. Check cnet at download.com.
Also, he suggested that I try to turn on all services. Everything that is not running, start it up and hopefully (maybe) the devices will again be recognized.
I'll post again after I have tried these things. I also have not heard back from the technician who I spoke with on the phone last night. I have an open case number with Microsoft so I'll get on the phone again this evening and keep at it.
If anybody has any luck, post or e mail me at <<jason a schlueter>> <at>> [[hotmail]] (dot) com. You can put it together.
- MRFREEZE61's solution also worked for me...I just kept pressing delete and enter until I got rid of the thousands of registry entries. I just deleted anything beginning with "$%&" which I found using the find command in regedit.
Thank you so much for posting this info here MRFREEZE61. As an early reporter of the problem - I would like to clarify a few points:
1st - No problem is exactly the same - no fix/workaround will work for everyone - sorry.
2nd - This problem (registry corruption) was directly introduced by the SP3 upgrade procedure. NO QUESTION !
3rd - Going back to SP2 will not work. The corruption remains.
4th - Waiting for Microsoft to acknowledge or fix this serious problem is foolhearty. If you have this specific reported corruption anywhere in "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\*ControlSet*\*" - you will likely have issues with your device manager (and more). It will not be resolved until you remove those entries.
5th - Waiting for a "magic" procedure from Microsoft is not likely. Unfortuneatly, if you have this specific corruption - you will have to do the work - find the entries - and remove them - or live with the fallout - until (and if) - resolved by Microsoft.
Those that have sent me private e-mails on conspiracy theories due to the competitive nature between Symantec and Microsoft - while intersting - I will leave it as: I was not happy having to spend 16 hours researching this issue - to solve an issue introduced by the SP3 upgrade. An issue that I excpect will be widespread - and likely to be talked about on this forum for a long time.
Good luck to those in my boat - Hope my fix works for you.
Regards,
Doug
Check out
HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Enum\Root\LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE.
I found a bunch of garbage keys in there.
Also try:
HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Installer\UserData\S-1-5-18\Products\596A69ABEC9EA2B41
You may not have that last one but you'll probably have the first one.
I won't have time to do more research until tonight.
I used the suggestion from MRFREEZE61 and it worked for me. Many Thanks!
It was a little easier for me to fix:
1st - I uninstalled Norton Antivirus 2008 (I did this based on a suggestion on another forum).
2nd - Searched the registry for anything starting with $%& (all mine ended up under LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE).
3rd - I just deleted LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE altogether. I didn't bother deleting each entry one by one.
4th - Rebooted - All devices were found - Device Manager was full again.
Thanks again for the forum help.
-Wancio
Have I understood this correctly - everyone suffering from this problem had Norton installed?
Thanks MRFREEZE61
I can confirm that MRFREEZE61 fix worked for me; although it took a very long time to delete hundreds of Keys in RegEdit
I can also confirm that the problem was certainly down to XP SP3; I upgraded two VERY well maintained (WSUS updates always applied) XP SP2 PCs. On one everything was fine on the other I had 3 problems: -
1) Device Manager was empty
2) No Local Area Network Icon in Network Connections
3) Office 2008 reporting to have failed WGA (Windows Genuine Advantage) checks, which prompted me to activate Office 2008. When I tried to activate Office 2008, it stated that it was already activated.
The only major differences between these machines were the following on the failed PC: -
Visual Studio 2003
Visual Studio 2005
SQL 2005
Norton 2008 (the other PC has Norton 2004)
Office 2008 (the other PC has Office 2003)
HTH
Regards,
Jon
I deleted everything in the registry under HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Enum\Root\LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE as you guys instructed. There was a bunch of crazy *** in there. Everything (so far) seems to be working.
Thank you very much.
Success!
I'm running Windows XP SP3 and Norton 360 Version 2.1.0.5 if that matters.
Running in Safe Mode and logged in as the Administrator, I deleted all the "dirty" registry keys from:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Enum\Root\LEGACY_CCPROXY
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Enum\Root\LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet002\Enum\Root\LEGACY_CCPROXY
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet002\Enum\Root\LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE
I rebooted the computer and my Device Manager and my Network Connections are back, Jack!
God bless,
Loren Wong
lwong [a t] edmunds [d o t] com
Associate Business Analyst
Edmunds.com | InsideLine.com | CarSpace.com | AutoObserver.com
I too had this problem with NIS 2008. Looking at the forums, this problem has been showing up with all the SP3 RC's so it makes me wonder wy they released it instead of fixing it.
- Wow, pardon my colorful metaphors, but MSFT REALLY phuked this up. I hope someone loses their job over this.
I upgraded three well-maintained laptop machines:
- one with NIS2008 installed and running during the upgrade;
- one with NIS2008 installed but shut down during installation; and
- one without NIS2008 installed
As you guessed, the one without NIS2008 upgraded like a charm. No problems. The other two have the same mess as identified by all in this thread [one side note - the WIDCOMM Bluetooth connection in my Dell XPS would not recognize my MSFT keyboard or mouse. It would try to connect but then reset into discovery mode. I reinstalled the MSFT Bluetooth USB key and it worked fine]
What this tells me is that MSFT did not QA this release with anything but their own software/hardware. You would have thought that with the checkered history of Norton tools running on Windows machines, MSFT would have ensured their QA suite would account for it. Obviously not.
I am now going to try Mr. Freeze's fix and report back... stay tuned.
/Howie - Howie, I wonder why you blame Microsoft, rather than Norton/Symantec? If a third-party add-on has critical bugs that damage a system, what can Microsoft do about it, without provoking enormous legal problems?
bighowie wrote: Wow, pardon my colorful metaphors, but MSFT REALLY phuked this up. I hope someone loses their job over this. - Why? You are asking why?
I will tell you why:
- After spending hours with Symantec support trying to convince them that they should care and QA their products together with MS before they release a major rollup like SP3, while they keep pointing out they are innocent, that it is NOT Symantecs fault, that MS will help me, etc.
- I am tired of the managers not taking responsibility to QA their stuff appropriately. It is the fault of BOTH managements MS AND Symantec that this happened. Do I have to be more clear?
- I went through several layers of a) a web site trying to get me not to call b) several techs that are never at fault and want to remote into my system to "fix the problem quickly" while they don't even listen to the issues c) entry level management that does not know or care either.
- This is a fault of the project management on SP3's end unless of course it is an intentional "oops" we did not know we closed out a competitor AV program, "oops" you should really be on Vista. That is a competitive advantage for MS. Symantec should care since they knew SP3 was coming, but did not, so they dropped the ball. That their service management stated that "it is still early in the SP3 rollout" after the thing went on "autoupdate" is just hilarious.
Since unless there is money involved in the feedback, nobody cares: my money after this experience, given as wide a problem this has to be and that neither one of the companies addresses it appropriately, is probably out of MS (and products) for a while.
Is that clear enough why? - Thanks Dataman. My sentiments.
Frankly, the release of SP3 is coming from MSFT, therefore the onus of QA is on them. That's how it works with any s/w company. To blindly give Symantec a pre-release and expect them to report to MSFT that all is OK without rigourous checks is irresponsible. So I agree, blame should fall on both parties, but MSFT for not ensuring all is good prior to release.
Back to my problem...
Uninstalling NIS is not the way to completely remove it. You must use the Symantec Norton Removal Tool (norton_removal_tool.exe) off their support page. I did this and it completely removed NIS (as well as the *** in the registry). Good news is the Device Manager returned, as did the network connections.
My NAS drives are still missing (after this first re-boot). Let me re-boot and see if they come back.
Cheers, - Alright... all is well. SP# upgraded systems are running as before. Culprit is SP3 botching up the Norton registry entries. Norton removal tool fixes it up.
Whew. I would have to conncur with BigHowie here... The responsibility rests with the actor, not the re-actor. MSFT's install created the problem, did not account for it, and has done nothing to address it. Sym worked fine before the SP3 install, and would be held harmless. Aren't we all glad we hit "I accept" on the license agreement? I feel like a lemming.
I would have to conncur with BigHowie here... The responsibility rests with the actor, not the re-actor. MSFT's install created the problem, did not account for it, and has done nothing to address it. Sym worked fine before the SP3 install, and would be held harmless. Aren't we all glad we hit "I accept" on the license agreement? I feel like a lemming.
MRFREEZE:
Please tell us exactly what to do and when to do it:
i.e., do we first delete the reg keys, uninstall norton, uninstall sp3, re-install sp3, re-install norton
or what (please tell the order of fixes).
THANKS!
Harnagel - (All),
In my case - While Norton/Symantec products were present on my computer - the startup of these products were disabled prior to starting the SP3 upgrade - and the corruption occured prior to restarting the any of the products.
Again for everybody - it was definetly the SP3 upgrade procedure which reliably corrupts the registry. Reproducable every time.
As for the order - I did not have to unistall/reinstall SP3 or any of the Symantec products - I merely followed the exact instructions in my post. Another poster to this thread indicated that he completely removed the Norton products with a tool available from Syamantec and then resinstalled those products - and that seemed to work for him - without having to perform my workaround. (Can't personally vouch for that workaround - I didn't try it)
If your not particularly technical - then I would recommend his approach (before attempting my posted workaround)
Highest Regards,
Doug
- I had the missing Device manager problem and had already reemoved SP 3. I removed Norton with the Symantec tool but still had the problem. I searched the registry and removed the remaining items. The Device Manager has returned. Thank you MRFREEZE61.
Hi there
i have the same issue and have tried MRfreezes fix and removed all enterys with $%& with regedit, i dont use norton just avira antivir and cannot say im impressed.
i like most others have
1) Device Manager was empty
2) No Local Area Network Icon in Network Connection3) My Computer takes 30 secods to find any drives etc
any ideas? apart from reinstaling
Thanks
----------------
Update
Just uninstaled sp3 an then re did Mrfreezes fix and now working -- thank you much apriciated for your time and trouble
think ill leave sp3 and vista sp1 updates for a long time - a very long time.
Ta
- Hi MRFREEZE61,
Thank You for investigating on this and helping resolving this problem. It worked for me.
In my case corrupted keys were also in ENUM\ but name was LEGACY_LIVE_UPDATE something...
I hope that Symantec and Microsoft will learn the lesson and bring some registry fixing tool soon for all others that can not handle this by themselves.
Doug, how did You find pattern for corrupted keys? Did You just browse registry and guessed that this is IT!?
Many thanks,
Lucas I had the same problem, the PC had started the day with Symantec AV10.1 on it, although that and Webroot SpySweeper had to be completely removed and the subinacl.exe fix applied before SP3 would even install (to get round the "Access Is Denied" message). Thanks to mrfreeze I searched the registry for the bad pattern, deleted the lot (figured if this completely hoses the PC then it's no worse then what MS had already achieved), and that fixed it for me. Considering this has now been breaking people's PCs for at least a week, and is fully documented here on their own site you might imagine that they would just withdraw the SP until they get round to testing it with obscure software like Norton Antivirus & Webroot's SpySweeper. Anyway, thanks again MrFreeze.
I encountered exactly the same issue as MrFreeze after installing XP SP3 on a well maintained Dell Inspiron 5150 Laptop. The machine has got NIS2008 installed on it as well, and this would appear to be the link with others who have posted threads here.
Indeed, upgrading to XP SP3 had already been a fairly painful experience - I also encountered the 'Access Denied' issue part way through the installation itself (that has also been well documented on the MSoft technical forum and elsewhere) and had to use SubInAcl to grant the appropriate permissions to get the installation to complete.
Hoping that was the end of the matter, I then noticed that my wireless icon had disappeared from the SysTray and access to My Computer was much slower than normal. I googled the problems and came across this thread..
I followed MrFreeze's instructions exactly and can confirm that this overcame all the issues for me and thankfully my machine is now back to normal. So a big thanks to him for his time and effort in tracking this one down. I would concur with others, however, that deleting all these corrupt keys manually is a pretty painful and time consuming exercise and would have expected Microsoft to have delivered a fix for this by now. (I found all my invalid registry entries by searching for leys including '$%&' within Regedit and apart from one valid entry, this was a pretty foolproof way of locating the offending ones, so surely it can't be beyond a technical expert to come up with an automatic clear-up routine?)
I have 2 other machines that I will need to upgrade at some point, but I will hold off doing this until I see that this issue has been resolved.
Anyway, thanks again and let's just hope SP3 is indeed the last Service Pack for XP! Can't really see much difference with Windows anyway as a result so it seems to have caused a lot of issues for lots of people for what would appear very little gain...
Cheers,
Keith
I too have been affected by the same problem. But strangely enough I loaded it to a HP ZV4000 laptop running NIS 2008 and it worked fine then I loaded it to a HP ZV5000 laptop running NIS 2008 and it has so many corrupt registry files that it would that it would take me hours to delete them all. The only good thing at this point I can say it I caught it before I deployed it to the rest of the PC’s on the network. I would thing that Microsoft could easily come up with a hot fix for us that have been affected to delete the corrupt registry keys.
Just my 2 cents
Jim S.- I'm having the same problem with XP SP3; the Device Manager is totally empty and My Computer takes a long time to display information. I upgraded from XP Pro SP2 to SP3. This morning, I uninstalled XP3 through the Control Panel's "Add Remove Programs" feature and it didn't correct the problem. The Device Manager is still totally empty and My Computer takes a long time to display information. Today, I will do a full restore of my XP Pro SP2 from a full backup I did. I'll keep you posted on the progress.Way to go Microsoft! Keep up the good work.Tom
CTBuckweed wrote: I'm having the same problem with XP SP3; the Device Manager is totally empty and My Computer takes a long time to display information. I upgraded from XP Pro SP2 to SP3. This morning, I uninstalled XP3 through the Control Panel's "Add Remove Programs" feature and it didn't correct the problem. The Device Manager is still totally empty and My Computer takes a long time to display information. Today, I will do a full restore of my XP Pro SP2 from a full backup I did. I'll keep you posted on the progress.Way to go Microsoft! Keep up the good work.Tom
An update: The "Safely Remove Hardware icon" in the Notifications area of the task bar no longer shows up nor does the system beep when I plug in / unplug my USB drive. Even after uninstalling SP3, it still doesn't work.
Also my HP 5600 USB printer doesn't work with SP3 or even uninstalling SP3.
Tom- I have the same problem.. so I checked my registry as you suggested.. Had to search for the damn things.. There must be a million scattered in two of the ControlSets and in Services... I lost my Bluetooth is how I discovered that the device driver display was empyt and now no bluetooth until I can access the driver. Thanks for the info...
This same problem has occured with 1 of my 3 computers with SP3. I did not feel like messing with the registry and possibly screwing everything up. I called Microsoft and was on the phone for 3 hs. talking to a tech support agent today and all the solutions she had did not work, so now I am going to be contacted by a research engineer to see if they know how to solve this problem.I have show no items in the device manager and no network adapters present in network connections. What is the problem with microsoft? Can they not fix this? What is the fix?
wbcer, if you've found this thread, then you've found the fix. Read this thread from the beginning. The problem seems to relate to the presence of Norton products on the PC, and registry corruption during the upgrade.
My Computer takes 25 seconds to load. Plus the other problems. I can not believe that MS would release a product with this type of problem. Getting rid of the "$%&" will take for ever. Maybe a clean install will be less painful. Right now I'll limp along and watch for a solution.
CTBuckweed wrote: CTBuckweed wrote: I'm having the same problem with XP SP3; the Device Manager is totally empty and My Computer takes a long time to display information. I upgraded from XP Pro SP2 to SP3. This morning, I uninstalled XP3 through the Control Panel's "Add Remove Programs" feature and it didn't correct the problem. The Device Manager is still totally empty and My Computer takes a long time to display information. Today, I will do a full restore of my XP Pro SP2 from a full backup I did. I'll keep you posted on the progress.Way to go Microsoft! Keep up the good work.Tom
An update: The "Safely Remove Hardware icon" in the Notifications area of the task bar no longer shows up nor does the system beep when I plug in / unplug my USB drive. Even after uninstalling SP3, it still doesn't work.
Also my HP 5600 USB printer doesn't work with SP3 or even uninstalling SP3.
Tom
Last night, I reforrmated the system drive and did a full restore from my backup tape that I made before the SP3 install. Now I am am fully restored without any SP3 hangovers. Thank goodness I did a full backup before the upgrade!- A tool is definately required. I also have thousand of $%&'()... entries and regedit cannot delete the keys.
I had the same problem as you. I restarted in Save Mode and ran regedit, used find with "$%&" to find each key and deleted each key that was found. It took approximately 2.5 hrs to delete all the keys found. Then I shut down the computer and brought it back up and my Device Manager repopulated and my Network Icon returned.
I did this on a HP Compaq Presario R3000 Laptop in Safe Mode and it restored my MMC Device Manager....No thanks to Microsoft!!!! I did back up the root file before deleting just in case I needed to restore them, then just deleted the whole root file and all subfoldersthat were full of junk files starting with ($%&...etc). After reboot the the malicious software update downloaded from Microsoft Update reported it had removed a number of maiicious files...Everything seems to be working fine now...Norton Liveupdate is working as well.
Thanks gmoorefan1 for this post. I tried everything else but this is all that would work for me.
Have a Happy Day!
Not PISSEDoff anymore....
- I can confirm the fix by mrfreeze does work.
I do not have any Norton software installed but still had the same problem. I did not experience the"millions" of entries as some have expressed. It took me about 5 min to delete all the entries if that. Again, other people may have more. I only deleted the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet and not anywhere else even though the find function found it elsewhere like HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001 and 002. MrFreeze's solution worked for me. Thank you!
I would like to see a reply from a MS rep regarding this. I feel that this is QA issue and that many people have been effected by it.
- BSECOtech
HI guys , I had the same problem..I restarted in safe mode with network support & then restarted back in normal mode
Problem solved.
I have symantec antivirus..
By the way i was running service pack 3 release candidate & uninstalled it before upgrading to service pack 3
I read many forums to solve the problem of Device Manager Empty / Missing Icons. I tried everything that was suggested short of modifying the registry. Nothing worked. I finally modified the registry, deleting all instances of $%&. It took me over 3 hours but it worked. Everything is back to normal. This occurred after installing SP3. Heres the kicker - I installed SP3 on 5 computers and only had the problem on 1. I wish some programmer (Microsoft) would write a program that would allow you to delete ALL entries of your choosing with a click of a button. There are other times a program like that could be useful (and dangerous). Bottom line - no easy fix.
I waited long enough I guess Microsoft is not going to release a Hot Fix so I just spent 2 hrs deleting keys as mr freeze detailed.
Were going to start swaping out the 250 PC on or network to Macs.
Have a great life Microsoft
Just had the same problem and solved it with Mr FREEZE solution.
My offending keys($%&) were located in
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum\Root\LEGACY_ LIVEUPDATE NOTICE
In all control sets
I manually deleted them all in safe mode(after changing permissions)
Rebooted and all was well,device manager repopulated and network icons back.
However i dont know why i did this but i checked the registery again and all the($%&)
are back again in the same locations.
But everything works ok now with no problems ?
Weird ???????????????
Thank you all for these posts....especially MRFREEZE61, I ran into this exact problem with three computers on our network....
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum\Root\LEGACY_ LIVEUPDATE NOTICE all sub keys had the $%&'( corruption and so on.
I simply just gave the EVERYONE group full control of the parent key..the permissions automatically propogated down...re-booted in safe mode and then deleted the entire key LEGACY_ LIVEUPDATE NOTICE ...re-booted normal and my problems are gone... In my case the registry key was re-created but with no corruption...Device manager and network connections is now available....Thanks!!!
Thank you MRFREEZE61 and the other that went before me. The fix work like a charm. I used EZ Marcos to delete 20 at a time. I estimate there were about 2000 entries. As a side, I had three versions of CurrentControlSet due to two failed attempts of the install and don't know if "$%&" were each version. I just sat there and deleted any that were found. Rebooting out of Save Mode made me a happy camper.
Again thanks to everyone that made it possible to recover from the disaster.
Solved for me as well, but I used a much simpler method...
(1) Write down Norton Product Key.
(2) Remove Norton products with the Norton Removal Tool found on Symantec's Website...http://service1.symantec.com/Support/tsgeninfo.nsf/docid/2005033108162039 (does a better job of removing registry entries)
(3) (May not be necessary) Search for the string "$%&" in regedit, delete the remaining corrupt keys (I found 2 'legacy' keys with several corrupt sub-keys)
(4) (May not be necessary) Delete the "Symantec Shared" folder from C:/Program Files/Common Files
(5) Reinstall Norton Product.
Good Luck!
-Kevin
I see no evidence that Microsoft is working on this issue, or even that they are mildly concerned about it, But, just in case it's helpful at all:
I installed SP3 on two computers. One had this problem, the other didn't. The differences in the systems:
(1) The unaffected computer is an older model (Pentium III vs. Xeon processor, 768 mb RAM vs. 4 GB).
(2) The older computer boots directly into Windows - no separate user accounts.
I am not a Microsoft basher, and I firmly believe there's no such thing as perfection. But, come on Microsoft - this whole situation, and the lack of response, is absolutely reprehensible!
Same here with Toshiba Satellite A60 and Xp Pro in Spanish.
Carlos.
carlos_esquerre@(sacar_esto)hotmail.com
This solution worked for me as well. Thanks to ALL who have posted! I would have never found the fix on my own and MS acts as if they are in no hurry to repair this huge screw up affecting hundreds of thousands of it customers.
Any one care for an Apple?
Wancio wrote: I used the suggestion from MRFREEZE61 and it worked for me. Many Thanks!
It was a little easier for me to fix:
1st - I uninstalled Norton Antivirus 2008 (I did this based on a suggestion on another forum).
2nd - Searched the registry for anything starting with $%& (all mine ended up under LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE).
3rd - I just deleted LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE altogether. I didn't bother deleting each entry one by one.
4th - Rebooted - All devices were found - Device Manager was full again.
Thanks again for the forum help.
-Wancio
Correction to earlier post-
This is the solution that worked for me except I didn't uninstall NAV before deleting LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE altogether.
Thanks again to everyone!
Like a lot of others... I have been dealing with this too... it was on two of my three XP systems (it spared the oldest machine).
I did use Mr Freeze's solution but I stopped after deleteing three branches worth of $%&... (maybe 20 minutes of Delete and Enter...). I decided to stop and see if anyone (that I trust) had written a clean up tool... after the reboot, the device manager and my network Icons were back... I still have a lot of garbage in the registry, but the system is running well again... at this point I'll wait for a hotfix or a cleaning tool (or write something myself).
I deleted three branches worth of garbage on my laptop and it's happy now it's happy as well.
A quick update... the garbage is in my third system as well, it just never showed the device manager and network icon symptom.
I suspect that anyone that checks will find this stuff in their registry.
Kudos and thanks to Mr Freeze.
I haven´t $%& string in all registry and I haven´t any symantec product installed. The problem continue. Any idea to solve?
Thanks
Carlos.
- Well, it does appear, in my case and as well as a friend I was collaborating with on fixing this problem, that locating and removing the offensive keys fixed the issues.
We developed a series of .reg files by dumping affected areas of the registry .. eg., all keys under HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\Automatic LiveUpdate Scheduler .. which is one of the affected stanzas in the registry. etc etc .. Editted the exported file.. Used the technique to delete the keys by pre-pending '-' to the keyname.. eg.,
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Services\Automatic LiveUpdate Scheduler\$%&'()*+,]
and processed a combined .reg file ..
It took a while to develop the .reg file.. but now .. it only took 5 min to delete the thousands of messed up keys. We've used the same 'composite' .reg file on several machines.
****** Now.. SOMETHING TO NOTE.. *******
You may not think you machine is effected. One of my machines seemed to be working fine.. no signs of missing device manager stuff, etc, etc. But upon investigation of the registry, I found the corruption was there. So.. I suspect it was 'a problem waiting to happen' or manifest itself. If you have Norton products installed, and you install SP3, it looks like you're gonna have this garbage in your registry.. whether it manifests itself thru some problem you can see, or not!
In our case(s), we have numerous Norton products installed.
It will be very interesting to see how MS addresses this problem. This is going to be a HUGE problem which is just getting worse by the minute with each SP3 install. - contact microsoft support - it is worth the wait
they will establish a remote session and fix the problem
below is the summary of my issue and the ultimate resoultion
it took about 30 minutes and my involvement was minimal - no reloading of any programs - no restoring actions requied
good luck! denni
ACTION : You were trying to use the device manager
RESULT : Unable to use the device manager
CAUSE : The device manger went blank after installing service pack 3
RESOLUTION : We deleted the HKLM\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Enum\Root\LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE and you were able to see the device manager Hey Doug / Mr Freeze, Just wanted to say that your solution saved my butt big time. I've been surfing the Net for days since I installed SP3 trying to find a solution. For anyone else with the same problem, be warned: I probably deleted 10 000 currupt keys, no exaggeration, all manually because you can't highlight and hit delete! Thanks!
I have no doubt MS is aware of this problem but is doing nothing.
My first indication, about a week and a half ago, was when an old program purchased retail almost a year ago indicated my "trial period was over" and I had to activate it. It would not reactivate with my key. I started hunting around and discovered Dev. Mgr was blank, things were slowing down bigtime - - long story short, I had a mess on my hands like everybody else in this forum but hadn't read this forum at the time. I called MS support. After an hour and a half on the phone, the guy said he'd "escalate" my problem. A different guy from MS called back a couple of days later and set up another remote session. The first thing he asked was if I'd tried Sys Restore. I had, but it hadn't worked at all. The next thing he did was check my registry - he went straight to "HKLM\SYSTEM\CURRENTCONTROLSET\ENUM" but did not say why. I believe he saw what he was looking for but did not say so. He said to try uninstalling my old program in Safe Mode and reboot but that he couldn't stay on the phone while I did that. He said he'd call back. I said to call me after the weekend. In the meantime, I found this forum and thank god I did.
Here's what worked for me, restored Device Manager, reactivated my program, etc., etc. It might not work for you, but it might. If you're not sure, back up everything you don't want to lose, messing with your Registry can be spooky. I did not do this in Safe Mode and it worked:
1) Go to Control Panel, Add/Remove Programs, and uninstall anything remotely having to do with NAV or Symantec. Before you do this, you should write down your registration keys if you haven't already so you can reinstall later.
2) Go to Symantec's website and run their Uninstall All Products program.
3) Run Search, search for Norton, then Symantec. Delete anything remotely having to do with either/both.
4) Open Run, Regedit, click Edit tab, click Find, type in $%&, check all three boxes, click Find Next. It will take a few seconds.
5) I was lucky and every instance of $%& was in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SYSTEM/CURRENTCONTROLSET/ENUM/LEGACY_LIVEUPDATE_NOTICE. Legacy Liveupdate is an NAV entry. I deleted the entire value, rebooted, and good things happened. You may have other locations where $%& is found and you may have to delete them one by one. Keep hitting Find Next until you've got 'em all.
So far, so good. I can't wait for the MS guy to call back Monday. How many folks out there are stumbling around trying to figure out what's wrong with their computers? Microsoft cannot NOT know about this, yet they've done nothing.
Thanks a lot, Bill.
I had the issue on two of my machines today after loading SP3. The first one I solved by manually deleting all the offending keys. On the second machine, I completely removed my Norton IS 2008 with Symantec's removal tool. I still had one group of offending keys to delete manually but it went a lot quicker than the first removal exercise. I was able to re-install NIS 2008 and my network and device manager icons are still there. What a horrible waste of time!
My PC (Lenovo T61) lost all of its Network devices, but a few days after the SP3 upgrade. Firstly, I noticed that the Network Connections page was empty, however the network continued to work at that stage, and then after the next reboot, ipconfig /all showed nothing and the network didn't work.
In my case, I uninstalled all the network drivers from the Device Manager page which was OK (also having uninstalled our corporate VPN software, Checkpoint FW1), and let the system re-detect the hardware. For me, this cured the problem.
I can not find any of the corrupted registry entries described, and don't (won't) have any Symantec/Norton software on my PC. I do not have a high regard for their AV software to put it mildly.
Given that it was a few days after SP3 upgrade, I do not know absolutely that it was at fault, however I had not recently installed anything else.
Regards
Peter
- I too have SP3 installed and running fine (no HP AMD or Symantec products). However I also have a registry full of $%& entries. I am disinclined to manually fix this as there looks like thousands of entries. I have turned off automatic updates on several customers machines until I see a fix for this or something that can be easily applied.
Please post here if you find something. - The removal of Norton AV2008 followed by the Norton Removal tool, then finally manual regedit removal of the errant entry's brought everything back. My only remaining problem is in the device mgr. I have 3 entries referring to my Ethernet adapter all with WAN SYMANTEC NETWORK SECURITY MINIPORT ....I cant uninstall...Whats up with these items?
- Tuesday, May 20, 2008 4:51 PM