Improve Vista Performance and Reliability with KB938979 Performance Update
If you feel that Windows Vista is buggy, Microsoft knows this too. Hence the release of Windows Vista Performance Update (KB 938979) which intends to improve the the performance of Vista system in certain scenarios. KB938979 hotfixes is not released via Windows Update or Automatic Updates yet, and may include as part of upcoming Vista Service Pack 1 (SP1), but you can download the update package from Microsoft Download Center.
KB938979 attempts to fix the following performance issues and bugs to increase performance, responsiveness and reliability of Vista :
- You experience a long delay when you try to exit the Photos screen saver.
- A memory leak occurs when you use the Windows Energy screen saver.
- If User Account Control is disabled on the computer, you cannot install a network printer successfully. This problem occurs if the network printer is hosted by a Windows XP-based or a Windows Server 2003-based computer.
- When you write data to an AVI file by using the AVIStreamWrite function, the file header of the AVI file is corrupted.
- When you copy or move a large file, the “estimated time remaining” takes a long time to be calculated and displayed.
- After you resume the computer from hibernation, it takes a long time to display the logon screen.
- When you synchronize an offline file to a server, the offline file is corrupted.
- If you edit an image file that uses the RAW image format, data loss occurs in the image file. This problem occurs if the RAW image is from any of the Canon EOS 1D and Canon EOS 1DS digital SLR camera models.
- After you resume the computer from hibernation, the computer loses its default gateway address.
- Poor memory management performance occurs.
Download Windows Vista Performance Update for x86-based System here.
Download Windows Vista Performance Update for x64-based System here.
Failed WGA validation check? Check out direct links to setup file.
KB938979 update can be applied to Windows Vista Enterprise, Business, Home Premium and Ultimate edition. Windows Genuine Advantage validation required so your Vista must be genuine and legitimate.
The download is in Microsoft Update Standalone Installer .msu format. But it works just like a normal .exe executable, simply double click to install the update.
Microsoft also releases another update KB938194 to improves reliability of Windows Vista.
Note: This KB938979 disables support for BCDEDIT /SET LOADOPTIONS DDISABLE_INTEGRITY_CHECKS commands that disable driver signing permanently to allow unsigned drivers to install on 64-bit Vista. So if you’re using patches such as Vista TCP/IP tcpip.sys maximum half-open connections patch or cracks such as TimerStop.sys and TimerStop64.sys (also applied by TimerLock auto patcher), make sure you remove the patches or cracks first.
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August 14th, 2007 02:12
[...] than KB93897 Vista Performance Update, Microsoft also releases another hotfix Vista Reliability and Compatibility Update KB 938194. [...]
August 14th, 2007 15:16
FYI if you have a patched tcpip.sys and Vista X64 your network will fail to start after you apply this Update. This is due to further code signing restrictions introduced with this update.
August 14th, 2007 15:41
Hi morphly, thanks, will update the article with your comment.
August 14th, 2007 22:32
With this KB938979 installed I have my two readers of DVD Plextor
Plextor DVDR PX-760A ATA Device
Plextor DVD-ROM PX-130A ATA Device
which are not recognized any more by my Vista Ultimate x64!
If I it uninstall they are again visible and usable !
Do you have the same problem and have you a solution? Help
Sorry for my bad english
August 15th, 2007 10:52
[...] of the side effect of installing KB938979 Vista Performance and Compatibility Pack in order to improve the performance and stability of Windows Vista is that it breaks the ability to [...]
August 15th, 2007 15:21
but the VistaLoader 2.1.2 is affected by this patch
August 18th, 2007 01:30
[...] KB938979 Vista Performance Update intends to improve performance and reliability of Windows Vista system, however, some users [...]
August 24th, 2007 17:37
[...] a long time to be calculated and displayed. Other than calculating estimated time remaining bug, KB 938979 update also addresses many other speed issues in Vista and worth installing to improve Vista [...]
September 1st, 2007 13:33
After installing both the Performance and Compatibility updates, my Vista started to stuff up quite frequently: explorer randomly crashes, WMP 11 takes long (longer than usual for me) to display song list on initial startup, sometimes folders in my hard drives take a while to display, etc. I dont know if it is directly related to these updates, but it sure started happening arounf the same time. Has anyone else experience these problems.
September 11th, 2007 21:23
Hi All,
After I installed this KB938979 hotfix for my Vista Home Basic system - I’m not able to install/update any DeviceDriver into my system. It always fails like - “Faulting application DrvInst.exe, version 6.0.6000.16386, time stamp 0×4549ad51, faulting module USER32.dll, version 6.0.6000.16386, time stamp 0×4549bdc9, exception code 0xc0000142, fault offset 0×00008fc7, process id 0xe1c, application start time 0×01c7f3cf53b2da1c.”
This error is always happening even for all those live updates that tries to update existing drivers. Also at the time of installing any new driver.
Please help. I was trying to uninstall this particular hotfix but uninstall for this hotfix was not working too (unstall statred and just got hang up for ever, if I rebbot the system the hotfix comes back).
Please some one help me.
Thanks,
Atom
October 7th, 2007 15:26
Though I had my doubts, it appears that this update is indeed safe to install for those of us with the 2099 crack (at least on 32-bit Vista). I had heard rumors to the contrary, and even went so far as to make a ghost image of my drive before applying the update, but it seems that my fears were, in the end, unwarranted.
January 11th, 2008 09:56
While certain recent Windows updates have disabled the “BCDEDIT /SET LOADOPTIONS DDISABLE_INTEGRITY_CHECKS” option (or possibly just introduced further security on top)… you can still use patched drivers (eg tcpip.sys for the connection limit) with the Windows updates… though some of you may find it a slight annoyance. If you tap F8 during Windows bootup, to get to the boot menu (where you would select normal mode, safe mode etc.), there is a (new?) option at the bottom of this menu “DISABLE DRIVER SIGNATURE ENFORCEMENT” (or words to that effect). Select this, and for this boot only there is no driver signature enforcement and everything will work fine - all vista windows updates and a patched tcpip.sys file (or whatever else you have patched). You will however need to do this every boot, and there is currently no (known) way to enforce this automatically at bootup. Either way, I hope this temporary solution works until either Microsoft gives control of the operating system back to the user, or the user snatches that control by force with a new method. Enjoy!
March 13th, 2008 10:50
[...] testing codes rushed to production to beat deadline. KB938194 Vista Reliability Update and KB938979 Performance Update fixes and patches various bugs, hardware drivers incompatibility, instability, unreliability, [...]