Are you tired of the by-now nag balloon from Windows Automatic Updates telling you that new updates are downloaded and ready to install, only to see that it is just Windows XP Service Pack 3, but you do not want SP3 on your machine because it crashed your computer last time? Well, my long phone call to Microsoft Tech Support in India will save you some work.
So here is a click-by-click to make that yellow shield go away from your system tray:
Click Start, Control Panel
Double-click Administrative Tools, Services.
From the list of services, right-click and click Stop for the following services:
-Automatic Updates
-Background Intelligent Transfer Service
-Cryptographic Services
Click Start, My Computer
Double-click the drive where XP is installed, usually C:\
Double-click Windows
Right-click on SoftwareDistribution, rename to SoftwareDistribution.old
Double-click on System32
Right-click on Catroot2, rename to Catroot2.old
Right-click on SoftwareDistribution, rename to SoftwareDistribution.old
Close window C:\Windows\System32
Go back to the Services folder and right-click, Start the following services:
-Automatic Updates
-Background Intelligent Transfer Service (unless it was originally set to manual, and you never had to stop the service in the beginning)
-Cryptographic Services
Close the Services Window and go to the Administrative Tools window.
Click the Back Button on your toolbar.
Double-click Automatic Updates
Select “Notify Me but Don’t Automatically Update Or Install Them” radio button then the OK button.
Close the Control Panel and resume computing.
