It is strange that it will not start up, I know you said you downloaded a c++ patch but Is this what you downloaded?
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=32BC1BEE-A3F9-4C13-9C99-220B62A191EE&displaylang=en
that is a required patch for windows users.
If you already have that and it is still not working, try downloading the standalone version of blender that does not require an install
http://download.blender.org/release/Blender2.44/blender-2.44-windows.zip
The only other possibilities that I can think of would be if you have a 64bit processor you would need the 64 bit version of blender, or your video card is so low end that blender won’t startup, however this is unlikely if you have a machine less than five years old.
Hope this helps!