Service Pack Removal Restores Compressed Files (164461)



The information in this article applies to:

  • Microsoft Windows NT Workstation 4.0
  • Microsoft Windows NT Workstation 4.0 SP2
  • Microsoft Windows NT Server 4.0
  • Microsoft Windows NT Server 4.0 SP2

This article was previously published under Q164461

SYMPTOMS

Several Windows NT system files are compressed on an NTFS volume after removing Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 2, and many of the files cannot be uncompressed.

CAUSE

On an NTFS partition, the uninstall directory created by Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 2 is compressed, to save disk space. If you use Update.exe to remove the service pack, the original Windows NT files are restored with the compressed bit still set, regardless of the original state of these files before removing the service pack.

Several of these files are in use by the system, and cannot be uncompressed while the operating system is running.

RESOLUTION

If you want the system files modified by Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 2 to be uncompressed, you can manually decompress many of them by removing the Compressed attribute in the Windows NT Explorer properties dialog box.

To uncompress the files that are currently in use by the system, you must either perform the uncompression from a parallel installation of Windows NT, or uncompress the %SystemRoot%\$NtServicePackUninstall$ hidden directory before removing Windows NT 4.0 Service Pack 2.

STATUS

Microsoft has confirmed this to be a problem in Windows NT version 4.0 Service Pack 2. We are researching this problem and will post new information here in the Microsoft Knowledge Base as it becomes available.

Modification Type:MajorLast Reviewed:5/13/2003
Keywords:kbbug kbsetup KB164461