[This entry was edited because I was ragging on the wrong update.]
I mentioned how my old system reboots right before showing a login prompt. It turns out my system was failing at that point, and Windows was (stupidly) configured to reboot automatically upon a system failure.
Hard to diagnose a problem when the system acts in denial. I’ve since disabled that option.
After rolling back my Windows installation a few times, I determined it was one of the Windows updates that was causing the failure.
The update for KB835732 causes a stop error at address 0x8042A72A. To wit, the error reads:
STOP: 0x0000001E (0xC0000005, 0x8042A72A, 0x00000000, 0x00000132)
KMODE_EXCEPTION_NOT_HANDLED
Address 8042A72A base at 80400000, DateStamp 4047db83 – ntoskrl.exe
I don’t know what any of that says, but a Google search revealed this udpate has caused quite a number of problems.
I’m inclined not to install any updates to Windows 2000, but at the same time, I would like a fully updated system. I may have to do what I did to determine the problem in the first place — install each update one-by-one.
Everytime I repair Windows from the CD-ROM, it rolls back about 31 critical udpates.
What a drag.