The moment I found out that Microsoft let Windows Vista Service Pack 1 out the door, I constantly searched for updates via Windows Update waiting for it to arrive. After waiting and trying for about an hour, I came to the conclusion that I probably have one of the problematic drivers.

I searched the Google to find a list of the problematic drivers and it wasn’t as easy to find as I was hoping but i did manage to get a list. My Conexant HD Audio drivers were preventing me from updating via Windows Update. I decided to wait a bit to see if I get a driver update that will allow me to get the SP1 update. I decided to download the 400mb standalone installer just for the sake of it. Its only 400mb and that will take less than 15 minutes to download. I just left it on my desktop and waited for something to happen so I could proceed with updating my operating system.

After listening to this weeks Windows Weekly yesterday, as they discussed the updating process and the problematic drivers, Paul Thurrot did mention that just because you don’t have updated drivers doesn’t necessarily mean that you are going to have problems. He has had emails from people that have installed it with the standalone installer and have had no issues or small issues that a driver reinstall didn’t fix. After hearing that, I decided to update last night. Either its going to go without problems, or I could try to fix it, or I could uninstall the service pack till my drivers updated. Updating shouldn’t me a nightmare.

I shut down all my apps and launched the installer. Then I went and played Locoroco on the PlayStation Portable while waiting for the update to install. It restarted and all itself and it didn’t need any user input during the update. One and a half hours later, I was finally treated with a login page. The update went smoothly with no problems. My system has been stable (so far.) I haven’t really noticed any major differences, only some copying stuff, the fact that it says Service Pack 1, and some aspects of the System Rating have gone up by a point. All in all, I’m pretty fine with the update. I could have waited and let it do it in the background and saved a few minutes but what the hey!