SP4- Access is denied

[sparkyputerguy]

Here's the situation-

Win2K Server/domain controller already on SP3... Logged in as Administrator. No special group policies set that I am aware of. When attempting to install SP 4, the first dialog box comes up for a few seconds and then closes with the error that 'Access is denied'. We have tried resetting permissions on all of c:\winnt and HKLM in the registry. There were some things that we could not set but didn't have 3 days to poke through the whole darn registry!

Other software can be installed just fine. In fact, we just re-applied SP3 in hopes that it would either fail in the same way, or allow SP4 to go on afterwards. No dice on either account.

I saw an article that XP service packs can detect pirated copies of Windows. I did not install server on this box originally so I can't swear it's authentic.

Any thoughts or ideas?

Thanks!

 

[minxca]

Hi,

Do you fail to backup the old SP or install? If it failed while archiving, check the GPO who has right to backup.

 

[sparkyputerguy]

I saw that article too and checked the policy. The Administrators group (which Administrator is a part of) is allowed to back up.

The install blows up just mere seconds after double-clicking on update.exe. I wish I knew what it's doing in the background while it's displaying the initial screen warning to close open programs and update your ERDs?

Thanks for the quick response!

 

[sparkyputerguy]

Ooops... Forgot to include a few more snippets. We checked out the svcpack.log file in c:\winnt. The contents are generally as follows:

Service Pack started with following command line:
***
PrepareToTrustInfFile: MySetupCopyOEMInf failed: 0x5
***
DoInstallation: PrepareToTrustInfFile Failed 0x5
***
Access is denied


And then it summarizes the errors and that's it.