BITS Error 1290: 0x50a following updates

Doug please see my reply to Xircal's post here linked in another thread that points back to here, there may be something about this issue that involves change to the qmgr.inf file but this is unconfirmed

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_xp-windows_update/latest-windows-xp-update-and-svchostexe-problems/57ff2a95-3a9c-4e85-a879-b340c65acfa5?page=13&msgId=2475d5f7-e7bb-4005-bda5-b54838baf9dc

Keith makes a good point. Also in reply to DougCuk_42, I lost BITS twice.

The first time seemed to be during automatic updates in November or December on my desktop, which looks frequently for updates by default daily. My laptop, which, although having the same settings is only infrequently connected to the router has been unaffected

• perhaps it received the cumulative fix instead of or before what was causing the problem? 

The second time I lost BITS was struggling through the repair process. I did not so much lose it as it became corrupted with the name apparently being changed into the pathname. I don't know exactly when this occurred, but it was almost certainly while trying to run one of the Fixits (all attempts at manual updates were failing at that time). I ran this fixit at least three times:

http://support.microsoft.com/mats/windows_update/en-us

in both automatic and custom modes. It ran and reported a partial success but other things it could not fix and then gave the option to go back to the website to find other solutions. I cannot be certain that this is the fixit which caused my problem as I may have run others (although I cant find any record of others in my file history), but I believe its the most likely.

Richard

Yes the error codes vary in combination and reinstalling BITS fixes the problem without really identifying what caused the problem/s in the first place.  It is like if you have a flat tire and get an entirely new replacement automobile it will fix the problem with transportation even if you never know what caused the flat tire in the first place.  But you could be driving away in your new car and have another flat tire.  So it could be good to know where the road is covered with nails.

The various fixes will eventually correct the broken BITS registry and re-register the DLL's - but the more curious issue is what is breaking BITS in the first place. I address that issue in a post on a related thread:: 

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows\_xp-windows\_update/bits-changed-to-systemrootsystem32qmgrdll-1000/9e59259a-ce09-42f6-9954-bfb6bb0f4f37?page=2

Obviously there may be many possible causes - and unless you identify the exact changes to the BITS registry it is impossible to speculate on the specific origin of the changes. Focusing on the state of one registry key - or one error message - does not give enough detail to identify a potential source of the "corruption".

This screen grab image http://www.stargateuk.info/images/MS-Fix-It\_XP\_BITS\_Registry.png begins to show the range of possible alterations to the BITS registry due to one specific cause - a faulty MS-Fix-It tool. Other culpits would leave a different "fingerprint" of changes to the BITS registry.