Vista: The update does not apply to your system

3. I've run sfc from an elevated command prompt with the /verifyonly parameter and with Windows in safe mode and still get the "Windows Resource Protection could not perform the requested operation" error.

Hi JL3008:

Before we go any further, please confirm that your system clock (Control Panel | Clock, Language and Region | Date and Time) is keeping accurate time (even the incorrect time zone can cause problems with some software updates) and ensure that all your media files and personal data are backed up to removable media just in case there's a serious problem with your Vista SP2 OS.

Have you experienced any other problems with your computer besides Windows Update since March 2016 (e.g., a BSOD or a malware detection by your antivirus)?  I think it's time for someone to take a closer look at your Windows system files and recent system errors, and I can recommend a few good free forums where you can post Windows dump files or diagnostic reports collected with more advanced tools like the Farbar Recovery Scan Tool (FRST) and get further assistance from someone with expertise in these areas.

I'd give PA Bear's suggestion to replace your Vista SP2 computer some serious thought, because tracking down the root cause of this problem could take considerable time on your part.  It might make more sense to simply re-install Vista SP2 (or find a legal copy of Win 7 and upgrade your OS) if you want to use your current machine until Vista SP2 reaches the end of extended support on 11-Apr-2017.

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Without seeing further diagnostics, my best guess at this point is that you could have a corrupted Windows user profile or Windows Update component or could have somehow corrupted the read/write/edit/delete permissions in some of your Windows registry or folders. You've wiped McAfee and BullGuard off your system, but it's also possible that you still have some third-party software on your system that is interfering with Vista SP2.  It looks like your computer was originally built as a gaming system, and I don't know if your ASUSTeK M2N8-VMX motherboard came it's own suite of utilities, but ASUS/Gigabyte applications like EasyTuneEngine that come with certain ASUS chipsets are notorious for causing BSODs and other stability issues - see the ESET support article *Blue Screen Error (BSOD) on Systems with ASUS/Gigabyte Motherboards with Chipsets H87/Z87 and H97/Z97* for one warning about ASUS drivers.

I'd advise that you avoid running MS CheckSUR (SURT) or try to run a file like the MS TechNet Reset Windows Update Tool script to try and repair your Windows Update components until you have further evidence that your problem is associated with a corrupted Windows Update component.  I can speak from personal experience that trying to fix a Windows Update error can go from bad to worse very quickly if you try to reset your Windows Update components on a machine with corrupted registry permissions.

32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox v51.0.1 * NIS v22.8.1.14 * MBAM Premium v2.2.1

HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS

Hello GWN,

The date and time on the system are accurate (I had to replace the battery on the motherboard a few years ago).

I do get occasional BSODs, but only ever on boot up, and usually when the PC hasn't been used for a few days. In these cases I just do a hard reboot and it invariably boots up second time. The error it reports isn't always the same (and sometimes it doesn't report any error at all). I don't recall ever having a BSOD once it's up and running. Since it seems to happen in fairly specific circumstances (starting up after a few days of inactivity), I've - perhaps naively - put it down to a hardware fault which, given the age of the PC, shouldn't be too much of a surprise. Maybe one area for me to pursue is to see if I can trace the cause of the BSOD next time it happens.

Norton has never reported any malware, and I don't have any ESET software installed.

So, I'm not sure what to do next. I appreciate I really need to replace this PC, but, as I say, I need to get a new car (mine's even older than my PC!), so that's the priority for this year, and why I'd just like to keep hold of the PC for another year. How much of a risk is involved in running an unpatched OS? Does having Norton installed significantly lessen that risk?

Thanks

I do get occasional BSODs, but only ever on boot up, and usually when the PC hasn't been used for a few days. In these cases I just do a hard reboot and it invariably boots up second time. The error it reports isn't always the same (and sometimes it doesn't report any error at all). I don't recall ever having a BSOD once it's up and running.

How much of a risk is involved in running an unpatched OS? Does having Norton installed significantly lessen that risk?

Hi JL3008:

Any intermittent BSOD should be investigated, regardless of whether it occurs during or after boot-up, and your BSODs could be related to the "Windows Resource Protection could not perform the requested operation" errors you see when you run System File Checker (sfc /scannow).  Please start a new topic in the bleepingcomputer Windows Crashes, BSOD, and Hangs Help and Support board and have one of the experts there analyze your past crash dumps - jcgriff2 has pinned instructions <here> at the top of that board on the information you should include in your initial post.  Once you've isolated and repaired the cause of your BSODs and sfc /scannow reports there are no issues with your system files come back to this thread and we'll see if we can get Windows Update working again.

I would strongly advise against continuing to use your Vista SP2 computer after extended support ends on 11-Apr-2017, especially if you have any important or confidential information stored on your computer or do any sort of online banking or shopping.  After 11-Apr-2017 it is inevitable that more and more software manufacturers will start withdrawing support for Vista.  Your Firefox browser is the last major browser that is fully supported and patched for security vulnerabilities on Win XP SP3 and Vista SP2, and Mozilla has already announced end of support for Firefox on these operating systems (see the Firefox support article Important - Firefox is Ending Support for Windows XP and Vista).

Your Norton Security v22.9.0.68 will provide some additional layers of security (click the "?" icon next to items like Exploit Prevention and Browser Protection at Settings | Firewall | Intrusion and Browser Protection to view related support articles) but your best protection is always a fully patched operating system.

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One comment about your Windows Updates going forward.  Even if you have a damaged Windows Update component, Torsten Wittrock's WSUS Offline Update tool mentioned in Note 6 of m#l's thread Updates not working, it has been searching for updates for hoursmight still be able to install missing updates for your Vista SP2 OS as well as MS Office 2007.  I doubt that tool will run correctly on your system at the moment, given that every standalone .msu installer you manually download and run is currently failing, but it's something to keep in the back of your mind after you've repaired your Vista SP2 system files.

32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox v51.0.1 * NIS v22.9.0.68 * MBAM v2.2.1

HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS

> I have 32-bit Vista Home Premium (but with a 64-bit processor...don't know why the manufacturer did that)

because every Intel CPU beginning with P-IV has been 64-bit capable (only first gen P-IV are not)

and every AMD CPU since Athlon 64

but not all system configurations support x64 installations

eg.

an Intel Atom based netbook with max 2GB RAM

can install x64 but it doesn't run well at all

as to the boot time start up BSOD

look on the Motherboard for blown caps

if there are blown caps then it's a lost cause

Norton has never reported any malware, and I don't have any ESET software installed.

Hi JL3008:

I don't want to take this thread off topic, but I only referenced the ESET support article Blue Screen Error (BSOD) on Systems with ASUS/Gigabyte Motherboards with Chipsets H87/Z87 and H97/Z97 because it explains how ASUS/Gigabyte utilities can cause your system to crash or become unstable.  See the following threads in the Norton forum where users experienced BSODs when their Norton antivirus ran a scan (I post in that forum as user lmacri).  The BSODs stopped when they uninstalled Norton, but an analysis of their dump files showed that the crashes were actually caused by a poorly written ASUS/Gigabyte driver gdrv.sys used by the EasyTuneEngine utility.  The problem just became more noticeable when they ran a virus scan with Norton because of the intensive read/writes and memory allocated to Norton during a scan.  The third thread discusses a problem with the ASUS Network iControl utility that resulted in dropped network connections after a Norton upgrade.

     Phoenix365: Norton Security Blue Screen From Background Tasks

     bahadir:       BSOD on Norton AntiVirus Security

     Cico66:        NIS 2014 Problem Internet Navigation in Windows 8 Pro

From the ESET support article:  "AI Suite (ASUS) and APP Center (Gigabyte) applications use drivers thatcreate memory-mapped I/O to access hardware ports in a non-standard way. If the memory is subsequently read by another process utilizing aW indows API function (for example, during a memory scan by ESET), it may have unpredictable results on the system and the system may crash..."

I have no idea if the chipset on your ASUSTeK M2N8-VMX motherboard came with utilities like EasyTuneEngine or ASUS Network iControl, but the moral of the story is don't assume your antivirus is responsible if your system crashes during a virus scan or your network connection becomes unstable after an antivirus upgrade, and don't assume a Windows Update component is corrupted if you see a 8000FFFF error message when Windows Update runs.  Run the proper diagnostics first and make sure you understand the root cause of the problem before you start making changes to your system that could do more harm than good.

32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox v51.0.1 * NIS v22.9.0.68 * MBAM v2.2.1

HP Pavilion dv6835ca, Intel Core2Duo T5550 @ 1.83 GHz, 3 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GS