What can I delete on my hard drive?

[Annie05]

Finally got courage to try msizap !g and it worked !!! reducing my installer file from 132GB to 1GB. So far no unwanted side effects. Now just need to figure how to stop it building up again through failed Windows updates. Any suggestions how I do this?
Thanks everyone.

Anne

[sach2]

Hi,

This gives us a cleaned up starting point to figure out if it is a particular update causing the failures of subsequent updates. A couple of things to try for a few days:

1) Run this command every day or so for about a week to give us a list of current files in the installer folder. It will keep adding a new listing each time you run it, so every day or so would be good.

dir C:\windows\installer /od >> C:\install_dates.txt

This will show how fast things are building up.

2) In a few days go to Start, Windows Update (or Microsoft Update) or Start, All Programs, Windows Update (or Microsoft Update) and click on Review your update history on the left. Look for any updates with a red X starting from April 30. Write down the name and KB number and date.

Post back with the failed updates from after April 30th and attach the install_dates.txt file. We can look for a pattern of which update might be causing the problem and try to install it manually.

[Annie05]

Hello,
here are the failed updates (all Office 2003) and the listing.

What can I do to get them to update successfully?

Anne

[sach2]

I'm going to have to take a closer look. It appears the first failed update is from August 21, 2009. I'll have to go through some of those KB numbers to figure out which one that is. I don't see any critical updates in that list. I'll definitely go through them but you may want to consider making a new post in the Software forum regarding failed Office updates. I don't use Automatic updates so I rarely if ever update Office and don't have any experience troubleshooting those updates.

I'll post back with what I find.

[Annie05]

I don't know if it helps. I have a listing of all updates going back in time. The first one that repetitively fails day after day is KB971931 for Junk Email Filter (on 16 July 2009) before being progressively added to by others.

[sach2]

I don't see that one failing in the current list. Go ahead and try to manually install the lastest junk email update that is failing and see if you get a specific error. http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/downl....aspx?id=28476

That might tell us something. As far as I see there are now 10 updates that are repeatedly failing. They are not all recent releases. I'm going to go through them all now to find the oldest one.

[sach2]

Ignore that last post and try installing this oldest failing update, manually. http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/downl....aspx?id=11403

Please note if you get any errors and try to give the exact error.

Edit: I wanted to add that if you just want to opt out of automatic updates for Office 2003 that is an option as well. It would solve your space problem with very little risk. I doubt security update for Office 2003 are really critical for the average home user.

[Annie05]

Thanks. I tried to install these updates and got the error message: the update cannot be applied. That is all it said.

Anne

[sach2]

I'm going to have to read up on possible solutions. That second link was to a re-released update that was intended to resolve a problem where the original version prevented subsequent updates. I'll see if I can come up with a solution.

Does Method 1 here http://support.microsoft.com/kb/821549 work to tell you if you have service pack 3 installed for Office 2003. If any of the programs show version 11.0.8173.0 then we know you have SP3 of Office. That would eliminate one possible problem. (I'm fairly sure you do but just want to verify.)

[Annie05]

Problem with method 1 is the only Office program showing up here is compatability pack for 2007 office system version 12.0.6612.1000.
When I go into Word it is version 11.8307.8221 SP3
Outlook is 11.8217.8221 SP3

[sach2]

Ok, so you have SP3 installed, I figured so much since the current failing updates are all relatively small.

It is going to take me a while to sort through some MS links to try to figure out where to go from here. I was hoping that re-released update would solve the problem. I find the MS links difficult to understand and rarely to the point. I'll take some time to see if I can find something relevant or a more clear cut fix.

[sach2]

Anne,

I haven't found a large number of others experiencing trouble with any particular one of your problem updates. I'm just posting to give a list of the "kb" numbers (sorted by date of release) in hopes someone on the board can find a solution. Guys, please google these numbers and find anything relevant! I see 10 updates that are failing in Anne's Windows\Installer folder between April 30, 2012 and May 04, 2012. You can see that they aren't particularly new but all relate to Office 2003 programs. I use manual update and rarely update Office so I a unfamiliar with these problems. It looks like each Office program has a security update and then Outlook has a few junk mail filters. The dates are in English format so Day of week/Month/Year.

kb973705  Security Outlook   2003  21/08/2009
kb2251399 Security Word      2003  28/06/2010
kb2284695 Security Publisher 2003  01/10/2010
kb2464588 Security Powerpoint2003  24/02/2011
kb2509503 Security Office    2003  03/03/2011
kb2553072 Security Excel     2003  26/07/2011
kb2553111 Outlook Junk Mail  2003  16/08/2011
kb2597035 Outlook Junk Mail  2003  17/11/2011
kb2597112 Security Office    2003  22/03/2012 
kb2598292 Outlook Junk Mail  2003  28/03/2012

The txt file attached shows the duplicates of those .msp files. They can be matched up with the KB(numbers) by date. Most have been downloaded 8 times in 5 days and others only 7 times. I haven't found anything that says one particular update could be causing the problem.

I'm hoping someone can get us a lead on the problem.

Anne, one other thought is that you should defragment your C: drive if you haven't done that since you cleaned up the Windows\Installer folder. With that much junk data removed it would definitely tidy things up.