Service pack 2 woes

[TheCrust]

This is in response to a thread I posted up some weeks ago now: http://www.edugeek.net/forums/windows-server-2008/35820-service-pack-2-a.html

 

We've been applying SP2 successfully to a number of our Windows 2008 servers - up until now.

 

One of our DC's fell over in the middle of applying the software. I'm not sure how it happened because I was distracted reading Angry Tech's blog, had my back to the console and didn't see exactly what the server did - but the bottom line is that the service pack install did not appear to progress past the pre-install phase before it terminated.

 

I have tried to re-run the install from scratch, but all I get is a message stating I "need to install Windows Server® Service pack 1 before continuing"

 

Checking the basic system properties, the system still thinks it has Service pack 1 applied, so I can only conclude that the service pack setup fell over while removing or modifying a file it subsequently uses to check minimum service pack level.

 

Does anyone know of a way to force service pack 2 installation to proceed?

 

Try as I might, I can't find any service pack 1 specifically for Server 2008 and although SP2 is common between Vista and Server, I am not going to try force-feeding SP1 for vista onto a DC "just for giggles".

 

Anyone got any suggestions or thoughts?

 

At the moment the server in question seems relatively unaffected by it's failed brush with SP2 but I am not optimistic it will stay that way and although I know a rebuild would cure it, it does seem drastic!

 

Ta in advance.

 

 

 

 

Jim

Edited June 19, 2009 by TheCrust

[PiqueABoo]

Did you fix it? There's a post out there somewhere saying "me too" several times and eventually (after someone opened an MS support call) that this is an SP2 bug MS are debugging. See here

 

[Will be installing a few times soon myself, so was interested in any solutions for potential problems]

Edited June 22, 2009 by PiqueABoo
Added link

[Michael]

Windows Server 2008 SP1 doesn't exist as such. What Microsoft did when releasing Server 2008, is to put it directly at SP1 level (in the name) to coincide with Windows Vista SP1.

 

2008 Server RTM = 2008 Server SP1

 

So when attempting to install SP2, if you're asked to install SP1 then it probably means your Windows installation needs repairing. In theory this should restore any required system files, then allow you to apply SP2 as normal.

 

It may be worth looking at the event logs for any clues why it failed first time.

[TheCrust]

Did you fix it?

 

Yeah, well sortof.

 

The yeah is because I did in the end, but the sort of is because it involved a complete reinstall rather than anything clever.

 

I wasn't aware of anyone else having issues - a spot of intensive googling hadn't picked up those posts you linked to (thanks for that by the way!) - so as there had been no feedback here up until when I last checked and yesterday was an INSET for us, I figured I might as well get on with the inevitable rebuild rather than risk wasting a day on a repair and then only have to rebuild it later anyway.

 

I started by moving the FSMO roles away from the box. That done, the plan called for a quick dcpromo to drop it down to member server status..... Only for that to fail immediately. Something about a signature not being present on the binaries (the exact error is written in my notebook on the desk in my office).

 

I couldn't even remove roles such as DNS - it just refused, even after a reboot and some harsh language.

 

So in the end I moved as much as I could off the box, putting another DNS server in to at least preserve the zone, and then downed it - removing it from AD manually via ADU&C.

 

It was then reinstalled from scratch using Windows Server 2008 Enterprise Edition media with SP2 ready integrated in that I downloaded from the Microsoft MVLS website - seems happy as larry after that.