I've learned (I thought) from past experience to be wary about system updates for Windows. Everything is tagged 'Important' it seems. Here's what I have today for example:
21 'Important Updates'--and here they are:
Starting off, I don't have any Microsoft Office 2007 on this computer. That eliminates all the Office 2007 stuff--shouldn't be on the list, obviously.
Next up are these Windows 8.1 Updates. I had previously 'installed' some updates on a prior time, and many of them failed, except ONE-----> KB2976978
That little gem said successful. About three days later my Office 2013 (specifically Excel) didn't open properly. First time it was a bunch of vertical lines where the info should be, the next time it was blank in the info area. Scared to death something had corrupted my Excel files. Stopped right there. Went through the 'repair' stuff in the programs page. No luck--came back with some kind of 'error' note. Luckily I still had my Office 2013 Program ID so after some contortions with logging on with Microsoft etc. I was able to reload Office. One hour+ lost to history, but I thought all was fine.
Three days later the SAME THING HAPPENED! I had created a store point after the first break, so restored that. Nope, still broken. Last thing I wanted to do was do all that download stuff again. I remembered then that little ol' KB2976978 was the only thing to update in my last go-round, so I went in and 'uninstalled' the update. Of course you know what happened.
Excel worked just fine again. Talk about avoiding a bullet.
Curiosity led me to check out - just what was this update supposed to do anyway? (Besides breaking Excel). Well here's what the support page says:
"This update performs diagnostics on the Windows systems that participate in the Windows Customer Experience Improvement Program. The diagnostics evaluate the compatibility status of the Windows ecosystem, and help Microsoft to ensure application and device compatibility for all updates to Windows. There is no GWX or upgrade functionality contained in this update."Wow, who else feels more confident now about Microsoft products? (Don't all raise your hand at the same time)...
