Apparent Conflict Between WFX 3.00a[b].005 & Windows Installer on XPP

from WinCustomize Forums
I was doing some cleanup on my XPP SP2 notebook today & was having a problem with the Add/Remove Programs applet. I tried to remove several programs & each time the uninstaller would hang my system at the initiation of the uninstall ('Preparing to uninstall...'). The 'Cancel' button would become active after awhile & allow me to click it - it would grey out but nothing else would happen, it was just stuck there. No specific error message, but after the 3-finger salute a DrWatson message would appear saying it 'could not attach to the process'. I did my usual drill of deleting temp files & cleaning the reg & rebooting but the same thing kept happening - each time I'd have to force a reboot & kill several non-responding apps after clicking off the DrWatson dialog.

I decided to test my SD apps just in case and the first one I picked was WFX. I unloaded WFX and again attempted to uninstall programs via the Add/Remove applet & bingo it ran without a hitch. Seems pretty clear that Windows Installer did not like WFX on my rig. Here's my SysInfo (from WB):

WindowBlinds version : WindowBlinds 5 (5.5 (build 92 x86))

WindowBlinds is installed correctly on this PC

WindowBlinds appears to be activated on this PC

Your machine does not support per pixel borders on WindowBlinds skins.

This is because :

Your computer graphics hardware does not support acceleration of per pixel alpha. WindowBlinds requires this for per pixel alphablended borders as without it performance would be poor. Please see if you can obtain new drivers for your graphics hardware. Recent ATI & NVIDIA boards should support this feature. Onboard graphics tend not to.

(Default Monitor) 1 is attached to RADEON IGP 340M

Wblind.dll 2007/02/21 15:06:20
Wbsrv.dll 2007/02/07 17:31:19
Wbconfig.exe 2007/02/15 13:35:52
Wbload.exe 2006/03/13 17:54:14
Wbhelp.dll 2004/09/18 16:37:07
Wbui.dll 2005/12/06 21:29:06
Tray.dll 2006/04/28 18:26:49
Wbload.dll 2005/01/22 18:05:07

All High Priority Windows Updates installed.

Thanks.
windowfx
5,549 views 7 replies
Reply #1 from WinCustomize Forums Top
This is still happening consistently - every time I try to uninstall something via Add/Remove Programs, the (un)installer hangs immediately after starting, just sits there doing nothing. I unload WFX and the uninstall immediately proceeds normally.

Not happening with program installs, only uninstalls, which seems odd, but there ya go.

The only features of WFX I've enabled are shadows, window & menu animations (fade in/out) & Advanced Desktop features (icon text color, background transparency & text shadow).
Galactic Civilizations III
Reply #3 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Reply #6 from WinCustomize Forums Top
I'm now wondering if WFX is also interfering with Windows Update installation. I've been encountering this for months but never considered the possibility that WFX might be involved until I ran into that little Add/Remove Programs uninstall conflict.

When running Windows Updates, the updates would all download & verify. Installation would initialize, and then the installation would just hang on the first update & I'd have to kill IE with TaskManager after awhile. I could still click on the Cancel button & it would immediately grey out, but IE remained hung. Returning to Windows Update & running the update installation again (the updates show as Downloaded/Ready to Install) would fail, no matter how many times I exited IE & returned. I'd have to reboot, then run Windows Update again, and usually the installation would then proceed normally, but sometimes it would take several reboots. It was a pain & a nuisance but it would eventually work.

Given the Windows Installer conflict I'd already encountered, and given that this problem was happening on all 3 of my rigs running WFX (XPP SP2, XP MCE, Win2K) I decided to unload WFX before downloading/installing updates on the XPP SP2 rig this month and had no problem with the update installation hanging. This is something that is not easy to troubleshoot, since it can't be "repeated" easily, but I strongly suspect there is something about WFX that Windows Update doesn't like.
Reply #7 from WinCustomize Forums Top
Have to back off on the Windows Update issue - I tried updating on my XP MCE rig without WFX running late last night & it hung on the first install repeatedly, despite multiple reboots; never did get them to install & gave up after awhile.