You are dead right, man!
Those WU hardware updates do really a mess.
Started hating them with the RAID drivers for NForce4 chipsets.
I second to you in your policy.
Carlos

"PvdG42" wrote:
[color=blue]
> "Poppy" <popybear@optusnet.com.au> wrote in message
> news:CE0ABD48-77AC-41FA-8B6C-A8C3D76D9073@microsoft.com...[color=green]
> > Here is a warning to those with Attansic L1 Gigabit network controller
> > chips on their motherboard, such as ASUS P5N-E.
> >
> > Do NOT, repeat NOT, install the recommended network adapter driver from
> > Microsoft Update. The recommended hardware driver appears with a different
> > manufacturer name, not Attansic. (sorry I can't remember).
> >
> > If you download and install the recommended hardware driver, Vista will no
> > longer boot normally. It hangs while the scrolling bar is on screen.
> > Because other things were downloaded at the same time onto my PC, it took
> > much time and fiddling to figure out the cause. Vista would boot into Safe
> > Mode OK. Control panel revealed nothing amiss. The clue was the failed
> > attempt to boot into Safe Mode with Networking. This suggested that the
> > updated network chip driver was the cause.
> >
> > Removing the driver while in Safe Mode did NOT solve the problem for me
> > because Vista seemed to reload the wrong driver ?from backup, upon
> > attempted normal reboot. Because of the mess I had made to identify the
> > problem, I needed to do a clean install to recover. Downloading and
> > permitting an install of hardware driver from MS Update reproduced the
> > same noboot problem. This time it was possible to recover to a last known
> > good state because I had a very recent good state to go back to.
> >
> > I suggest hiding this particular update if it is recommended for your PC.[/color]
>
> Thanks very much for the report, as I have a PC for which that driver update
> is recommended.
> I have adopted a policy of *never* updating *any* drivers through WU, and
> your experience leads me to recommend my "policy" to others :)
>
>[/color]