O.T. (sort of) New XP Updates

[Dan_AKA_ROY]

XP has a new service pack. It's huge like 250 MB. Our computer tech guy told me to hold off! He wants to be absolutely certain Mastercam won't have any problems. He wants to backup my entire system to be on the safe side.

 

His reasoning is this is almost like a new OS, with its numerous security fixes and other updates. It is not your typical XP update.

 

He told me to ask the "Mastercam experts". They know more than him and he'd take note to your suggestions.

 

What do you guys think? Any thoughts on this? Thanks for your time!

[Toolfab]

When did this pack come out? I havent even heard of it yet?

 

Pauly teh goes to do some research...

[Steve Biehl - Cimquest Inc]

I just ran a windows update and there are no additional updates for me to do. Mastercam Mr0304 runs fine on my system. Do the XP update, worst case you might need to do a 'repair' install of MC.

[Bullines]

So far, on my system, it would appear that Mastercam (and even the X beta) plays nicely with SP2. I haven't had any incompatibilities with any apps and SP2, so far.

 

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When did this pack come out? I havent even heard of it yet?

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To OEMs, last week. To the public, yesterday.

[Mackius]

quote:

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XP has a new service pack. It's huge like 250 MB. Our computer tech guy told me to hold off! He wants to be absolutely certain Mastercam won't have any problems. He wants to backup my entire system to be on the safe side.

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Wow you guys have a computer tech guy, what a waste of money. Anyway i've run SP2, and so far i haven't had any problem with it or with mastercam.

 

Actually i like most of the security features sp2 delivered, especially the pop-up blocker.

 

[Dan_AKA_ROY]

Steve, thats what I was figuring.

 

XP service pack 2 should be out by today, I think. In fact, I got an alert. I ignored it since our tech told me so. He will have it on a CD and wants to backup my system first. He says he always plays it safe rather than be sorry. He said problems shouldn't occur, but with service packs its best to air on the side of caution.

 

Anyway, just doing a reinstall in case something goes wrong sounds right to me.

 

I doubt there's anything to worry about. He wanted me to let the experts know, so I started this topic.

[Bullines]

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XP service pack 2 should be out by today, I think

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It came out yesterday. If you have Automatic Updates enabled, you'll be getting it....eventually. There's other ways to get it, though. There's a download available, but Microsoft prefers that it be used by administrators who have to install it on multiple computers (my conscience is preventing me from posting the link but it's not hard to find ). But it works fine on any computer. Microsoft just doesn't want its server to get swamped. An alternate route would be to fire up your favourite BitTorrent client (mine's Azureus) and get SP2 from here.

[Dan_AKA_ROY]

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Wow you guys have a computer tech guy, what a waste of money.

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Well, he's also our accountant, GM, and CEO! j/k

 

For us, he is very valuable. We had a CNC guy setup our new vertical mill. Our maintenance apparantly didn't ground it properly and the CNC guy didn't install surge protectors. He came back and was stumped. Our tech guy solved everything. We blew our I/O ports and had to reroute it to another port... Around here, thats pretty dog gone technical!!

 

We grounded it properly this time and added surge protectors!

 

We need Dave in our shop. Now, if we were a higher tech type of place maybe he's not needed. But here? Oh, yeah, you betcha!

[Henk]

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worst case you might need to do a 'repair' install of MC.

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I'v a copy of all MY files: cfg, default operations, toollibraries, posts, chooks, patches etc. in a safe place.

I can copy them over a new install, and off I go

[Dan_AKA_ROY]

Thats a good idea, Henk.

 

And good advice!

[bryan314]

We have one guy testing it right now. If he has no serious problems and no problems are reported on emastercam I'll be upgrading the rest of our shop next week. So far, he's only had difficulties with some third party programs, not essential to his job, and the programs web site already had updates for xpSp2.

 

Also he he reports the OpenGl tooltips bug (Mastercam uses OpenGl) is fixed also. For those not familiar, If a program uses OpenGl and is running, on some xp machines (all of ours) the tooltips don't update when you hold your mouse is over an item. You have to run the mouse over the item several times for the tooltip to show right.

 

Bryan

[Storkman]

I installed SP2 with version MR0304 and haven't encountered any problems. YET! You never can tell with Microsoft.