Daylight Saving Time change problem

Topic

New Reply

Why did Windows set the clock on my computer ahead by two hours? This happened in both XP and Windows 7.

Reply | Quote

Replies

It just reset it self. What is going on here?

Reply | Quote

It would have set it for daylight savings time, but that would only have been 1 hour. Are you sure it was correct to start with?

Reply | Quote

Me too.

I read your post with mild interest in the middle of the night when my (computer) clock had advanced by the proper one hour, but it appears that this afternoon some time, unless I missed it sooner, it advanced an additional hour.

I should add that my computers are not left running continuously, and that could be a factor. Was your computer on all the time?

I strongly advise setting the clock to the correct time ASAP (single-click on the time, then ‘Change date and time settings’). You can get into all sorts of trouble if you fail to do so.

Reply | Quote

Windows default is to sync with time.windows.com. Check your Event Viewer for W32Time events.

cheers, Paul

Reply | Quote

Windows default is to sync with time.windows.com. Check your Event Viewer for W32Time events.

cheers, Paul

That is what my computer was set to sync to, but I don’t think that is what advances it an hour for DST (which I think happens whether or not you are online). On the other hand, if both happen that would explain the extra hour in certain circumstances. The frequency or day and time for the online clock sync is a possible major factor, since most probably have it reset weekly at most and probably on a default day at a default time.

I’ll have to wrap my mind around this for a while to see if I can figure it out if no one else beats me to it, as I had expected to happen long before this. There may be extensive legal implications to it, especially for businesses, as you may have realized. As it happens I was in the middle of making an online purchase when I realized that I should abort that and correct the time before proceeding.

Reply | Quote

Is there a chance that the wrong time zone is entered and that changing to Daylight Savings Time in the specified time zone could have been the problem?

Reply | Quote

The time zone was correct. As I said earlier the problem corrected itself and is showing the correct time now

Reply | Quote

The time zone was correct. As I said earlier the problem corrected itself and is showing the correct time now

I appear to have misread the second post. It definitely did not correct itself in my case, and I am left to wonder if your computer’s self-correction was due to a scheduled time sync.

Reply | Quote

Did you check your Event Log for time events?

cheers, Paul

Reply | Quote

Did you check your Event Log for time events?

cheers, Paul

I haven’t had a chance to do it yet, but I will do. In the meantime the microwave’s clock display is blinking at me, and there may have been a power failure somewhere along the line.

Reply | Quote

Are you by any chance running a duel boot system? If so, did you boot into both sytems around the time of the clock change? If so, set only one of them to update the clock, I’ve run into this problem in the past with older Windows systems when dual booting between OS’s but am currently only running single OS systems and so can’t test this idea. Just a thought… Hope it helps, Murray

Reply | Quote

Are you by any chance running a duel boot system? If so, did you boot into both sytems around the time of the clock change? If so, set only one of them to update the clock, I’ve run into this problem in the past with older Windows systems when dual booting between OS’s but am currently only running single OS systems and so can’t test this idea. Just a thought… Hope it helps, Murray

I agree with Murray. I ran into this exact same problem with dual boot a few years ago. It did not matter if the boots to both partitions were near each other or near the time change.
The problem is that both updated the CMOS clock. I corrected manually, but I suspect the WIndows time sync probably would have fixed it soon anyway.

Reply | Quote

Hallo there!

My WINDOWS 7 ULTIMATE was updated via windows update (manual update by me – I have AUTO update turned off) 2010-03-20 with a fix for daylight time issues.
It could be related to the problem you describes. See the following link to Microsoft for a description of fix KB979306):
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/979306

Regards
S-O

Reply | Quote

I confess I am quite preoccupied (in spite of an unusual number of posts from me of late) BUT this topic is becoming very interesting indeed thanks to your replies.

Yes, I have a dual boot system. The default is Win 7 Ultimate N which, if you weren’t aware of it, means that it is the European version of Windows on a computer here in North America. I applied a patch and added the missing software (IE and Media Player, I think) but there is the remote possibility that this is somehow tied to its being the European version.

That is the system that gained an extra hour. The other system, on a separate physical drive, boots into Vista, and it experienced no problem with the time change.

Reply | Quote

What Time Zone are you using?

I ask because Windows still differentiates between Eastern and Eastern (Indiana).

I live in Indiana, and until April, 2006, we did not observe Daylight Savings Time. Since that change, there’s been Windows updates that addressed the time changes, but there’s still a difference between choosing the two different time zones.

Before the change, I noticed behavior similar to what you describe. Now, I set all my computers to Eastern or UTC-5:00

Reply | Quote

What Time Zone are you using?

Before the change, I noticed behavior similar to what you describe. Now, I set all my computers to Eastern or UTC-5:00

Eastern Time (US and Canada) – same as you. UTC – 5.00.

Reply | Quote

Windows has always had problems with time, due to design faults.

Other OSs can cope with daylight saving time and changing time zones. Unix I understand is such an OS.

However my experience is with the EPOC OS used on Psion computers. Although Psion computers have not been made for a decade, many folk like myself still use Psion computers every day.

The EPOC OS saves all dates in GMT. So travelling between Europe and US, the user just changes his location and thus automatically the visible clock changes to local time. But all date & time details are still saved in GMT.

Those who used a Windows computer to backup their data had problems twice a year. Normally an incremental backup would occur. But when Windows changed to/from DST, then the backup program running on Windows did a full and thus very long backup. (Part of the comparison included the file date/time stamp and Windows could not cope with this.)

This problem still exists and programs like ‘ViceVersa Pro’, which I use on XP, have an option to cope with this problem.

The solution (with Win98) was to remain always in normal time and just manually adjust the clock. This also solved a problem, reported above, of my clock changing by 1, 2, 3 and 4 hours when ever I first used a partition after the bi-annual change.

Unfortunately with WinXP this causes problems with Outlook as e-mails were shown as having a reply received before sending my initial e-mail!

Many of my early digital photographs have date/time stamp errors. The file date has been changed by Windows by 1, 2 or 3 hours (out by a few seconds), from the original taking time stored within the picture.

Windows changing to the NTFS has to some extent reduced problems, but in typical M$ style, introduced new problems!

Probably the suggestions above about timing of the hour switch and the weekly sync of time over the internet, is correct.

Reg

Reply | Quote

Windows has always had problems with time, due to design faults.

Windows changing to the NTFS has to some extent reduced problems, but in typical M$ style, introduced new problems!

Yes, FAT drives have a problem with how times are stored. Time on NTFS drives is always UTC. See File Times (Windows) and other topics under About Time (Windows) for a more complete discussion.

Joe

--Joe

Reply | Quote

Yes, FAT drives have a problem with how times are stored. Time on NTFS drives is always UTC. See File Times (Windows) and other topics under About Time (Windows) for a more complete discussion.

Joe

So why, and I quote my first posting?:-

“Unfortunately with WinXP this causes problems with Outlook as e-mails were shown as having a reply received before sending my initial e-mail!”

Outlook and it’s OS, XP- SP3, can’t display the correct time, with only NTFS drives.

But using automatic change for DST, there is no conflict, but with DST switched off, there is an error of 1 hour.

You might ask why I don’t want to use DST? I use 4 digital cameras and 3 GPSrs. So changing these twice a year is too much.

As I drive between two time zones, my track logs would have problems. One way a one hour gap and the other way, the same hour repeated. Solve that!

Reply | Quote

So why, and I quote my first posting?:-

“Unfortunately with WinXP this causes problems with Outlook as e-mails were shown as having a reply received before sending my initial e-mail!”

Outlook and it’s OS, XP- SP3, can’t display the correct time, with only NTFS drives.

But using automatic change for DST, there is no conflict, but with DST switched off, there is an error of 1 hour.

You might ask why I don’t want to use DST? I use 4 digital cameras and 3 GPSrs. So changing these twice a year is too much.

As I drive between two time zones, my track logs would have problems. One way a one hour gap and the other way, the same hour repeated. Solve that!

These are issues of your making not problems with Outlook or XP. The date/time received is indicative of when the e-mail was received at the server to which Outlook connects to retrieve the e-mail. It most likely has the correct time.

If you choose not to deal with daylight saving time that is your problem. On a system with NTFS formatted drives, XP & Outlook just convert the UTC times according to the settings on the PC. What else would you have happen?

Joe

--Joe

Reply | Quote

The date/time received is indicative of when the e-mail was received at the server to which Outlook connects to retrieve the e-mail. It most likely has the correct time.

On a system with NTFS formatted drives, XP & Outlook just convert the UTC times according to the settings on the PC.

Joe

Those are things I didn’t know. I do know that lawyers are much concerned with esoteric matters like ediscovery and computer forensics. For this enlightenment, much thanks. (It still leaves the recipient in the dark without a lawyer – but I guess that is what lawyers are for.)

Reply | Quote

The date/time received is indicative of when the e-mail was received at the server to which Outlook connects to retrieve the e-mail. It most likely has the correct time.

On a system with NTFS formatted drives, XP & Outlook just convert the UTC times according to the settings on the PC. What else would you have happen?

Joe

This sounds reasonable Joe. So the assumption is that the server is correct because it is using GMT/UTC. Probably correct as most likely running on Unix/Linux.

So If my XP system is set to ‘(GMT) Greenwich Mean Time : Dublin,Edinburgh, Lisbon, London’, then both my clock and that on the server should be the same. GMT is GMT and not GMT+1 !!!

Ticking the box for ‘Automatically adjust clock for daylight savings time’, should, I would have thought meant adjust (or change) the clock by one hour twice a year.

If I do the same manually there ‘should’ be no difference. But there is. So this suggests to me that the tick box should have – ‘display time one hour ahead during summer’.

But this still leaves a question mark for those running multiple partitions, with each changing the clock by an hour. Maybe the solution for this situation would be to keep all boxes ticked and then manually reset the clock after the use of subsequent partitions.

Having read your posting I’ve looked at another setting available, that is ‘(GMT) Casablanca, Monrovia’. That does not have the tick box, so maybe that is the setting I need to run on GMT throughout the whole year. Only have to wait until Sunday to test it out.

Reply | Quote

It was explained to me that when MS released the time zone patch, it didn’t check to see if it was already installed. Hence, if you got the patch twice (or already had it included in the OS), it would jump 2 hours. 3 installs = 3 hours, etc.. Supposedly MS caught this and adjusted it in a later patch. (How nice of them. I can hear it even now. “Oops!”) I guess we’ll all find out in the fall how well they corrected this.

Reply | Quote

This is turning into the most interesting thread in ages and I regret to say (at this stage) that I am just sitting back and reeling it in. I did have one dandy question and answer which I’ll have to try to remember in full so that I can post it.

In the meantime, I return to one thing that I mentioned in one of my posts, and that is that there may be extensive legal implications.

I don’t know if many (or any) lawyers are tuning in (lawyers in this neck of the woods at least tend to use WordPerfect), but from any who are out there (or are tipped to the thread) we might expect to hear any number of explosions (in court or out) about computer systems that don’t know what time and date it is. If anything happens on or about the date of the time-change gazillions of dollars (or the currency of your choice) might depend on arguments already posted, or yet to be posted, in this thread. There is nothing academic about this; we are talking about big money

Edited to add:

Why quit there? Where are the bankers and fuzz (if you will pardon a dated expression, in this case not intended to be derogatory). I think it is this very week (unless it was last) that was designated (in this jurisdiction, at least) to be anti-fraud week, or something of the sort. There have already been scams or at least marginal games in moving money from time zone to time zone, and what to a con man could be more inviting than… well, you get the idea.

I don’t want to give bright ideas to bad people, but I think someone had better pay close attention to the possibilities (not to mention, to unnamed giant corporations’ lawyers, such matters as due diligence, corporate liability, and so forth.)

Reply | Quote