Adobe on the other hand plans to release security patches for its popular PDF reader Adobe Reader that are also rated critical. The updates will all be released tomorrow and system administrators will certainly their hands full updating the computer systems that run the software and operating systems.

A closer look at the Microsoft Patch Day reveals eight critical security vulnerabilities and five important vulnerabilities that will get fixed with the patches that are released tomorrow. The majority of vulnerabilities affects the Windows operating system but it does also include one critical Internet Explorer vulnerability.

System administrators and Windows users are encouraged to visit the two websites linked above for further information. These websites will also contain the links to patch the security vulnerabilities. Windows users can also use Windows Update, Microsoft Update or Automatic Updates to update their operating system.

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But let me give you a brief description of Autopatcher before I continue. Autopatcher queries the Microsoft update server and downloads all patches and updates from that server to your computer. When I say all I mean all for the operating system or software (like Microsoft Office) that you have selected.

This procedure has several benefits over automatic installations. All patches and updates are downloaded to the users computer and can be used to update several computers, even those without Internet or network access. It is furthermore possible to select the updates that should be installed on the computer and those that should not be.

You begin the process by downloading the Autopatcher Updater from the Autopatcher website. Unpack it to your hard drive and execute the file. A list with possible operating systems and applications will be shown and some of them will be preselected.

Make sure you do keep the Autopatcher Updater and Autopatcher Engine entries checked. You can then make your selection from various Windows editions, languages and applications. Available languages are currently English, Italian and Portuguese.

A click on Next will download all files and patches to your computer directly from the Microsoft servers. The process finishes quickly and will place a file called autopatcher.exe in the root folder of the directory. Start that file afterwards which will load a list of available patches and updates for your operating system.

Items are sorted by critical and recommend updates as well as updated components and Registry tweaks. Already installed patches are marked blue while those that have not been installed yet have a black font color. Simply check the updates that you want to install and click the next button which will start the installation process.

I did not encounter any errors, freezes or even crashes during my tests which is definitely an improvement since the last version that I tried.

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Fortunately for him there is indeed an easy method to upgrade Windows XP without contacting a Microsoft server at all. This of course is only half the truth, some software products like IE7 and Windows Media Player 11 contact Microsoft during installation. You can either use one of the techniques described in my posts to avoid this or choose to not install those programs.

The current Autopatcher file size is about 350 megabytes in size for Windows XP and can be downloaded from the Autopatcher homepage. I suggest you use a torrent or a mirror to ease the load on the main servers. You also find versions for Windows 2000 and 2003.

Download the full Autopatcher release for your language and after that the smaller update for January. Install both on your computer and run the application afterwards. The difference between full and lite versions is that some third party products (e.g. Java from Sun) have been removed from the package, all Microsoft patches are still inside.

Autopatcher scans your system and displays a list of patches that could be installed. The following categories exist:

1. Microsoft Windows – Critital Updates
2. Microsoft Windows – Recommended Updates
3. Microsoft Windows – Updated Components
4. Microsoft Windows Genuine Advantage
5. Windows Addons
6. Registry Tweaks

The first three are automatically (partially) selected. I would advise to check the patches manually and remove everything that seems unnecessary. Click on Update after you have made your selections and Autopatcher will update your system.

Autopatcher is great if you have to update more than one operating system. Instead of downloading all the patches several times you do it once. Great time saver.

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