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Windows 10 Will Soon Let You Opt-Out of Automatic Driver Updates (pcworld.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from PCWorld: Microsoft is giving users some more control over Windows 10 updates, with a new beta build of its operating system released Monday. The build allows folks with the Windows 10 Professional, Education, and Enterprise versions to defer new updates for up to 35 days. In addition, the company will allow those users to decide whether or not they want to include driver updates when they want to update Windows. It's a move that helps respond to one of the key criticisms of Windows 10: that Microsoft's regime of forced, cumulative updates has caused problems for users with some configurations. This way, users can steer clear of updates they don't want to install yet and dodge problematic driver updates. The newly-minted update changes are just one part of the improvements added to Windows 10 with the build released Monday. Microsoft is also working on making the initial Windows 10 setup more accessible using Cortana. The company's virtual assistant can ask users questions at setup -- when they speak languages that it can understand -- and use those answers to configure devices. A small number of beta users will also begin to see a battery life experiment pop up on their devices. Microsoft is also giving users an easier way to connect to a virtual private network. Once Windows 10 has a user's VPN settings loaded, it's possible to activate the connection with the tap of a button without opening up VPN settings.
I already opted out of ALL updates in Windows 10 by opting out of Windows 10!
What about letting us choose everything we want to update?
Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
My Microcrap box is back running Windont 7.
I, for one, enjoy having to roll back the update that disables my touchpad's right click button every time I use my new laptop. /wish I were joking
When will MS just up and admit that they aren't in the business of desktop computer software anymore?
Windows 10 is just an XBox with a keyboard and mouse. You have the same amount of control over the OS (basically none) and they're used for the same purpose (playing games and watching TV)
This signature is false.
Updating my recent drivers with outdated drivers is not cool.
I'd prefer an opt-out of the UI 'improvements'.
If only they would let us opt out of Windows completely and switch to Linux, then we could all have an operating system that does what we tell it to do. Alas, they will never allow that.
OH THANK YOU my benevolent overlords from Redmond!
Please, let me lick your boots for granting me this unprecedented freedom!!
Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
The software doesn't allow you to do what you want.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Nope.
All changes to my system have to be OKed by me, with full disclosure of exactly what those changes are. Nothing gets a free ride to do as it pleases.
Mickeysoft have made themselves a legacy OS out of their unwillingness to remember who's computer it is.
Windows Insider builds can break stuff, period. I've lost count of the many times I saw this warning while studying the docs and following the procedure to become an Insider.
Yes, I've been burned with a bad video driver once and a bad wireless card driver a couple weeks ago. Shit happens.
If you can't deal with it, then there are a few options:
1. Fall back to the Slow Ring.
2. Do a clean reinstall and stay on Release Preview.
3. Quit the Insider program altogether and do a clean reinstall.
I've used Home Single Language, Pro, and Enterprise, and they all have the option to Defer Updates. All you have to do is follow the news on the Feedback Hub and enable the option when you find something you wouldn't like to install. Bonus points if you're on the Slow Ring, as there are fewer bugs and more time ffor you to receive the update.
Finally, you only have yourself to blame if you entered the Insider program on a production or system-critical PC as opposed to a VR or spare / secondary PC.
Nearly every home computer is running Windows 10 Home. So this means that most of non-education non-enterprise users still don't have the ability to turn off the automatic forced updates, and reboots. Jebuz, Microsoft, why can it be so hard to the way it used to be in Windows 8?
Microsoft should shove all auto updates up their ass.
Why?
They have no problem shoving them up everyone else's ass.
I was about to write some really snarky prose until I read the rest of the article and realized that the headline was a dog whistle specifically for me. There's some good stuff there, for the poor souls who accept such limited control over their computer.
At first I thought this was a self-driving-car-AI story. Windows 10 driving cars, what could possibly go wrong?
"Officer, um, Windows crashed, and I with it."
Table-ized A.I.
I go so tired of seeing Windows 10 insist that there was a mandatory update that I just had to install that instant that it wouldn't let me do anything else until I did (except shut the machine down then reboot, giving me a day before it got bitchy again) that I fixed my Windows system to never get updates. So I guess I'll never get this one.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
We have to watch this carefully for the next months see where it leads.
I want the Hookers and blackjack version of Windows 10
Nice Newspeak(TM) spin there.
It's not an improvement. It's a fix, to a facility they broke in Windows 10 -- namely, the ability to control the update system.
And if we're being perfectly honest here, it's not even a fix. It's a workaround to a facility that never fscking worked in the first place , i.e. installing device drivers through Windows Update. Never. Worked.
And deploying this workaround serves as tacit admission by Microsoft that they they haven't the remotest clue how to fix it. Even after locking out those terribly pesky, annoying users and arrogating all administrative control to themselves with Windows 10, it STILL. DOESN'T. WORK.
Editor, A1-AAA AmeriCaptions
Were they untested or something? Years of automatically accepting updates on Linux (kernel and otherwise) across varying hardware and it's been extremely rare that I've experienced any issues at all...
Is all the software/drivers on Windows considered bleeding edge? Is the hardware not abstracted such that it would cause a complete meltdown with no user interaction possible? Are recovery options insanely complex for the user?
Twinstiq, game news
Given the forced telemetry, Windows 10 doesn't even exist for me.
And forced driver updates is so absurd!
Forced anything is wrong!
The privacy cost of telemetry greatly outweighs the savings in QA. The stability cost of forced driver updates greatly outweighs the benefits of making all Windows installations synchronized (making the PC a predictable target, like a console/phone).
It is so sad that people at Microsoft, Facebook, Google, Unity, Apple, etc., can accept the immorality of some of their data collection efforts. And it's especially sad when the justification basically amounts to, "everybody else is doing it".
When a user uses a service which explicitly requires the user to volunteer information essential to use the service (e.g., user enters search terms in to a search engine), there is transparency. But beacons on every web page, and browser fingerprinting, and ultrasonic sounds from web page to microphone, and sending every keystroke in an address bar or every spoken word to Microsoft/Google/Apple/Canonical/Amazon/LG/Samsung/Sony is very wrong.
I've already opted out of their damn mandatory updates.
The tablet I use ( Wacom Studio Pro ) simply isn't allowed to connect to the internet. I transfer all files I create on the tablet to my main system via USB stick or just upload it to the local NAS. I do not, and will never, allow a Windows 10 system to talk unrestricted outside of my local network.
As such, the tablet performs flawlessly and I don't worry about some untested bullshit Redmond pushes out that will deny me use of my hardware. In the event I ever load software that requires a periodic connection to a server, I'll simply block everything except the server address ( or the address block of the company that owns the software, Eg: Adobe ) let it say hello, then go dark again until the next hello is required.
When MS starts getting fined or slammed with lawsuits for releasing shoddy updates, they may be a bit more stringent in their QA testing before they release it.
When will Microsoft allow me to opt out of the egregious data harvesting?
Ha! Shows what you know, there was no beta release on Monday. Oh, wait, today is Monday. Well, let me check the Feedback Hub. Well, what do you know, there is a new release. It wasn't there earlier today.
Yeah, because that was such a problem compared to the forced harvesting of your personal data, the resorting to outright malware tactics to trick people into "upgrading" and all the other arrogant assholery associated with Windows 10... On a scale 1-10 I'd rate it "3, bloody annoying", while the rest is off the scale well into criminal behaviour.
Did you know there’s a version of Windows 10 that doesn’t get big feature updates, and doesn’t even have the Windows Store or Microsoft Edge browser? It’s called Windows 10 LTSB, short for Long Term Servicing Branch.
Upvote the parent comment.
...that wouldn't require Edge, would it?
I mean this literally... other than Windows 10 salespeople, who cares? Every decade or two, when it's time to get a new Windows, I go to the Windows store, and I buy something that they have in stock, within my budget. I couldn't care if it had mandatory driver updates, optional driver updates, or FairyDust driver updates. A Windows is a Windows is a Windows.
Linux.
aaaaaaa
Where have I heard the "soon we'll have..." bullshit before... right, in the speeches of politicians.
Sorry, but announce it when it's here. Until then, why the fuck are you waking me again with stuff that simply is not newsworthy?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Finally they did it! Sometimes you are working and the Pc start to update without warning and everything starts to fail.
Make windows great again!
A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
It shocks me how many people on Slashdot don't know GPOs or the registry values they manipulate. It was always easily opt out for those technically inclined that know how to use Windows generally.
Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
Beep Boop +5 Insightful
Micro$oft did a thing! It's a thing we asked for previously, but it's still bad because it's M$!
You won't be thinking much about forced Telemetry (Which is also mandatory in Server 2016 BTW which will be GREAT for Hippa and Gov't use!) when your upset about your machine not working right or rebooting by itself to perform a 1 hour mandated updated.
Microsoft has achieved what google vowed not to do... Become Evil. Microsoft is now synonymous with Dis-trust.
This Christmas I built 2 brand new PC's and both run Windows 7. I control the schedule of when and what I want to update. Windows Update and GUI were the deciding factors in my decision. You can still purchase legitimate unused OEM keys from 3rd party re-sellers for about $30! I was skeptical but indeed they were valid. I don't really want to advertise but I got them from Kinguin. The difference in price between home and pro is only $8 so I was like eh why not lets go for Pro. Only problem is they're OEM keys (read below for issue).
Since optical drives are practically useless these days, getting a physical install DVD is pointless. So just buy the keys online, install from ISO, and voila. Works brilliantly with Windows 7 home and pro.
I did run into an issue not finding a Win7 Pro ISO because Microsoft's ISO download site doesn't recognize OEM keys. Thankfully I already had a legit home ISO saved from playing with VMWare where I used my retail CD key to download the ISO for it. Used that to install Home from a USB drive.
Home install won't allow you to register a Pro key, so once home was installed and I was on the desktop (without validation) I did an in-place upgrade to Pro and it immediately recognized my Win7 Pro OEM key. Took an additional 2 mins after desktop to do the Home>Pro upgrade as it forces an additional 50MB windows update file. The Home>Pro upgrade doesn't actually reinstall the entire OS like I thought, it only grabs a couple extra files during the first windows update, meaning that everything for Pro is already there in a Home version but simply disabled. Whole upgrade process was almost instantaneous, had no idea it worked like that. First time I'd ever actually upgraded to Pro. Blew me away that it was so quick and painless of a process.
Until Microsoft gives me completely control of what/when for Windows Update I'm sticking with Windows 7. Windows 10 GUI mashup of NT + Metro is a puke fest of discontinuity. I'm much more productive professionally and personally with Windows 7 and at the end of the day that's what should count most in my opinion... efficiency and time management. For an operating systems that once hailed itself as the ultimate in word processing and business productivity it's taken a nose dive since Windows 8 and doesn't compare to Windows 7... not even close.
I heard somewhere that they were going to rename Windows 10 since it has such a bad reputation. Rebranding always fixes that. From what I heard the front runner name is HAL.
Giving me the option not to brick my (or is it their) computer.....
there has been a setting in the group policy that does just this for a while. it seems to work, all my pcs now nag me in the middle of my games usually fucking it up requiring me to relaunch it.
Optimizing drivers for games? That sounds completely backwards. Drivers should be optimized for the hardware, and DirectX should handle any optimizations that need to be passed on to the driver. Is DirectX not doing its job? And all the game should have to worry about is talking to DirectX. It seems pretty straightforward. Why in the world should drivers have to worry about what one specific user application is doing?
Twinstiq, game news
Linux runs on a lot of mixed hardware and works pretty reliably, sure it is a percentage of users but we are all using the same hardware for both Linux and Windows, not every Linux user has the same hardware and nearly all devices are supported
The user should always have control whether to update his or her system. I refuse to willingly install this on any system until control is granted. Sorry MSFT you have unsold Windows to the more technically inclined.