I have been unable to install the last two released versions of ZoneAlarm on a fresh install of Windows 98 SE. During the installation, a message appears saying ‘Validation failed for C:WINDOWSTEMPVSINIT.DLL. You are probably missing a necessary root certificate’.

The most common explanation for this problem is that the system clock is incorrectly set to the wrong date/time. Certificates use the date and time to verify their validity and if the date/time on your computer is incorrect, the certificate may appear invalid (due to the date/time set on your computer being outside the valid date period on the certificate). So, make sure the date and time on your computer are correctly set using the ‘Date/Time’ control panel. Also make sure the date/time set in your BIOS is correct. To do this, you will need to enter the BIOS setup when your computer starts. During the POST (power on self test) a message will appear informing you to press a certain key to enter the BIOS setup (e.g. ‘Press DEL to enter setup’). Press the nominated key when this message is displayed, and once you are in the setup, check the date and time are correctly set. Only try this procedure if you are confident in modifying the BIOS, since any incorrect changes could make your computer unbootable.

Should the date/time be set correctly and you are still unable to install ZoneAlarm, you may need to update the root certificate on your computer. Download the root certificate update ‘rootsupd.exe’ from the Microsoft website at: http://download.windowsupdate.com/msdownload/update/ v3/static/trustedr/en/rootsupd.exe). When downloaded, double-click on ‘rootsupd.exe’ to install the update. The update will install silently, with no user feedback once complete. After the update is installed, try running the ZoneAlarm setup again to see if the problem is resolved.