Solved KB2926765 Bad May Update on Windows 7 leaves system unusable.

[MTS52]

After doing the May Updates to my Windows 7 box I received this error after a reboot.

"Windows cannot access the specified device path or file. You may not have the appropriate permissions to access the item".

By trial and error I traced this behavior to KB2926765 in particular.
When this update was installed I could not get start-up progs. eg. avast etc to load.
Also when trying to start any other exe's I got the above warning.
I restored an image done before this bad update and all was well again.

My only hope was to hide the update so windows wouldn't try to load it again.
AS this exact same outcome had happened to me before, I knew what I was dealing with.
In the past I have also had to hide two updates for the very same behavior.
One of them was KB27981692 the other I didn't write down.

The first time this happened searches on the internet led to others who experienced the same problem after a bad update.
This time I was only able to find one instance of somebody encountering the same behavior.

By posting this I am hoping others have encountered the same problem as me.
Any comments welcome. Google searches lead me nowhere.
Lots of possible explanations for the error but none to do with a bad windows update.

Cheers!

 

[Damian Adelle]

Hey MT. You know, something similar happened to me with a netbook, I did a full clean Win 7 install, but everything crashed as soon as I started to update the OS. Later on, I realized the HDD was almost dead, I checked with HDtune, and it was in a very dangerous state.
HD Tune website
I also have made some searches, and some people relate this to Office, do you have it installed?,
Trying to UPDATE office, get error "Windows cannot access the - Microsoft Community

Windows cannot access the specified device, path, or file
also, some other people suggest this may be a virus or some malicious agent,
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20110618073004AA0zVyS
and also suggest running windows in safe mode to use Malwarebytes Anti-Malware. It doesn't hurt to try.
Malwarebytes | Free Anti-Malware & Internet Security Software

 

[MTS52]

Hi Damian,

Thanks for your reply. I have already seen the links you posted. Have done much searching the last two days.
As I said previously I can say for absolute sure the problem is KB2926765.
I installed all updates except that one, did a drive image with Macruim Reflect and then tried installing it again.
Same story. This is the third time that a windows update has produced this behavior.
Each time I have had to hide them from windows update so my system doesn't get hosed again.
Having learned this lesson twice before I now run full AV and malware scans with 5 programs and then image my drive before doing windows updates. It only takes me ten minutes to get back up and running when disaster happens.

Cheers!

 

[dukes27]

Re KB2926765 update. After installing Mays updates my PC stopped recognising simple 'Compressed (zipped) Folder (.zip)' files which were already on my PC and the right click 'Extact all' option is missing as well. Have downloaded & extracted these zip files every week for past five years with no problems at all. After a process of elimination I uninstalled the KB2926765 update and Pc is working fine again. I don't won't to install new Zip extraction software on my Pc but Windows update is still asking to install KB2926765 update. Any ideas

 

[Damian Adelle]

Hey MT, I just saw your post on the Microsoft Community in a search, let's see if someone from Microsoft can give you more details about this particular update, because I'm reading the description and it's a little ambiguous, I don't clearly understand what security issue this software is having (whichever that is).
And dukes, you could hide the update with the right-click menu, but like I said, I'm not sure what this update does, so let's see if Microsoft could give more assistance, because I updated a couple of PC's and I haven't had this issue.

 

[dukes27]

Hi Damian, Thanks for reply, you are right i could hide the update but M.S. have it down as 'Important Security Update' not an 'Optional' The question could be will not installing the update give more problems in the future ? Have read postings on other forums about this KB2926765 update in which they think the problem is linked to 'Adobe flash player' ? also one posting thinks KB2926765 update is for Win 8.1 not Win 7. Food for thought ! Will keep the update at bay in the meantime.

 

[datiswous]

After installing Mays updates my PC stopped recognising simple 'Compressed (zipped) Folder (.zip)' files

Aaargh, I have the exact same issue.. I used system restore to revert back to a save state. Will wait a couple of months, maybe it will be addressed by MS.

 

[dstutzman]

I believe this particular update may be responsible for other errors as well: http://www.sevenforums.com/general-...working-startup-after-update.html#post2777296

 

[Ranger4]

Hi Damian, Thanks for reply, you are right i could hide the update but M.S. have it down as 'Important Security Update' not an 'Optional' The question could be will not installing the update give more problems in the future ? Have read postings on other forums about this KB2926765 update in which they think the problem is linked to 'Adobe flash player' ? also one posting thinks KB2926765 update is for Win 8.1 not Win 7. Food for thought ! Will keep the update at bay in the meantime.

You have mentioned Adobe Flash Player in this post. In case you are not aware I received an Adobe Flash Player Update yesterday, 16 May 2014. Also received one for the Active X version on 10 April 2014. These are as follows. Maybe worth following up.
Adobe Flash Player 13 Plug in version 13.0.0.214 16 May 14.
Adobe Flash Player 13 Active X version 13.0.0.182 10 April 14.

 

[DavidE]

Hi Damian, Thanks for reply, you are right i could hide the update but M.S. have it down as 'Important Security Update' not an 'Optional' The question could be will not installing the update give more problems in the future ? Have read postings on other forums about this KB2926765 update in which they think the problem is linked to 'Adobe flash player' ? also one posting thinks KB2926765 update is for Win 8.1 not Win 7. Food for thought ! Will keep the update at bay in the meantime.

You have mentioned Adobe Flash Player in this post. In case you are not aware I received an Adobe Flash Player Update yesterday, 16 May 2014. Also received one for the Active X version on 10 April 2014. These are as follows. Maybe worth following up.
Adobe Flash Player 13 Plug in version 13.0.0.214 16 May 14.
Adobe Flash Player 13 Active X version 13.0.0.182 10 April 14.

Adobe Flash Player 13.0.0.214 is the latest version for both Plug in and Active X.
Adobe normally updates Flash Player on the 2nd Tuesday of the month (Windows Patch Tuesday).
http://www.sevenforums.com/browsers-mail/311-latest-version-adobe-flash-player-73.html#post2774883

I subscribe to all the SF "Latest version of..." threads.
It's a nice way to get informed of updates

 

[Ranger4]

Thank you DavidW7ncus for that information on Abobe Flash Player Active X update.

 

[dukes27]

Hi Ranger4, had already checked my A.F.P. was up to date after reading other postings, normally have A.F.P. set to 'notify me to install updates' but now showing Automatic Installs, strange. But just in case Adobe Flash Player 13.0.0.214 was causing an issue with KB2926765 update i did full uninstall of A.F.P. reinstalled KB2926765 but still getting the same issue as before, have uninstalled KB2926765 update and everything is back to normal. Note ; check out these threads.
Patch Tuesday again so?
"Windows Explorer has stopped working" on startup after update
"e

 

[MTS52]

Hi Dukes,

Uninstalling KB2926765 most definitely does the trick. This is exactly what happened after installing KB2798162 a while back. More and more people are reporting issues with this update. Wish someone from Microsoft would chime in with a fix.
I have posed the question on the Microsoft Community site but have yet to get a reasonable explanation.
I don't believe it has anything to do with Adobe Flash Player update as others have suggested.

 

[NoelDP]

This type of update will often break things when the system is already infected - I suggest that you do a couple of scans with good offline malware/virus scanners.

 

[MTS52]

Hi Noel,
To quote from one of my earlier posts:
"Having learned this lesson twice before I now run full AV and malware scans with 5 programs and then image my drive before doing windows updates. It only takes me ten minutes to get back up and running when disaster happens."

It is not virus related.
I am also curious as to what "This type of update means"
What type of update is it exactly.

 

[NoelDP]

It's an update that addresses an zero-day vulnerability - in other words, there were already active viruses/malware in the wild when discovered.

 

[tbone7698]

I just had the exact same problem. I installed a bunch of Windows updates, and after the reboot it didn't have file associations for .exe files. Like the original poster (MTS52), I restored my computer and started installing the updates (then rebooting), one by one, until it happened again. I found KB2926765 to directly be the cause. I restored again, loaded every update BUT KB2926765, and no problems. I don't know that I agree with the whole Java update being part of the problem. I work with Cisco gear, and a few months back the Java update killed ASDM. I had to uninstall Java and install a previous version (on my work PC). Being that I work from home sometimes, I haven't updated Java on my personal PC in months. So I had this problem and no java update was ever involved. Hope this helps.

 

[dukes27]

Hi tbone7698 you are right about Java not being the problem, I uninstalled and cleared anything to do with Java from my PC a good six months ago after the last round of scares associated with Java, I regularly run scans on my PC ie: Kaspersky I.S. / MS windows malicious software removal tool / Kaspersky TDSSKiller / Malwarebytes all good. It's looking more like that KB2926765 is a just bad update affecting different Pc's in different ways depending on what the Pc is asked to do, I only found out after trying to open a simple zip file. Hope this helps to shed more light on the problem.

 

[MTS52]

KB2926765 Problems Resolved,

After days of trying to find a fix for this update not installing I thought to check the firewall history.
I use Online Armour firewall with HIPS and sure enough it was blocking Shell32.dll at startup.
This was preventing the firewall, avast and all other startup programs from executing.
For that matter any exe at all.

I tried the update again, then disconnected from the net and put the firewall into learning mode for the reboot. I am still confused as to how the firewall was blocking anything at all as it wasn't starting.
If anyone else is still having trouble installing this update see if it is firewall related.

Good Luck.

 

[woward]

We are having the exact same issue on Win7 Pro 64-bit - upon restart after installing this update none of the startup programs will load and all .EXE files are inaccessible. I've been unable to find any fix. We ARE NOT using any 3rd party firewall programs - we run the default Microsoft programs for firewall and Win Security Essentials. I've tried setting a restore point before installing the update but after restarting cannot access the "Restore" programs, even when a computer is started in SAFE MODE. The only solution has been to restore the computer to it's post-update mode from an image backup and ignore this update.


Any solution is welcome as I hate to leave an "Important" security update uninstalled. How about a solid fix from MS.


Bill