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Questions tagged [windows-update]

Integral service in Windows since Windows Vista that updates Windows components, including installed components and drivers, and certain other Microsoft software, notably Office.

Windows Update

Microsoft Windows Update is an integral service in every modern Windows operating system, that gives users the ability to update the Microsoft software and operating system in their computers, including installed components and drivers.

Starting with Windows Vista, all Microsoft product updates are no longer performed through the Microsoft Update Website. Included with the operating system, the Automatic Updates control panel has been expanded to access the new and revised Microsoft's Windows Update service.

Operation

Users of modern Windows operating systems by default no longer perform manual updates to their Microsoft products (including the operating system). The operating system performs automatic searching and installation of updates. Prior to Windows 10, users could configure Windows Update to not perform automatic updates, or to inform them before installing new updates.

Links

Windows Update Service.

Windows Update (Microsoft Help Website).

Windows Update (at Wikipedia).

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How to *disable* automatic reboots in Windows 10?

Windows 10 lets you 'schedule' a reboot for later. I want to disable it. Evidently Windows scheduled itself for a reboot last night when I wasn't looking and just closed everything I had been working on the night before. I reboot on the regular; I…
mpen
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Windows 7 SP1 Windows Update stuck checking for updates

I installed Windows 7 fresh and installed SP1. Now, when I try to check manually for Windows Updates it just hangs on the Checking for updates screen. I tried running the tools in How do I reset Windows Update components?, but this did not fix the…
Mikey A. Leonetti
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Can I delete the folder "C:\WINDOWS\Installer\$PatchCache$"?

This folder is taking up nearly a GB of my C partition. Is it possible to just delete it?
James
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Why is checking Windows Update so slow?

I have Windows 7 PCs that have automatic update turned off. I do updates in batch once a month or so. But each time "check for update" takes 15 to 30 minutes. I don't understand why checking for updates can be so slow? I have to wonder what is…
some user
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What are all the Windows 7/8/8.1 updates (KBs) I must skip to avoid Windows 10 upgrading -and nags-?

It's been a time I didn't follow the list of which Windows 7/8/8.1 KBs I must skip since I don't want the unfinished Windows 10 at all. Moreover, I will still consider Windows 10 unfinished (-> unstable) until they release Windows Server 2016 The…
X.LINK
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Stopping all automatic updates Windows 10

We've upgraded some machines to Windows 10 and realized there were some updates which updated as required. However, I realized there was no option available to stop the download similar to that on Windows 7 and 8.1. The only way I could stop the…
Izzy
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svchost.exe high memory usage - wuauserv

I'm running Windows 7, and I've been experiencing high memory usage from one of my svchost.exe processes. Services under that particular process are BITS, EAPHost, IKEEXT, LanmanServer, MMCSS, ProfSVC, RasMan, Schedule, SENS, SharedAccess,…
Oliver
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Can I get more information on what Windows Update is doing?

It often happens that I have to watch this screen for minutes: I have no clue what's happening in the back. And I'm also not interested in watching the WindowsUpdate.log for changes. I would love to know if there's a way that gives more feedback.…
Oliver Salzburg
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Safe to delete "C:\WINDOWS\SoftwareDistribution\Download"

One of our Windows 2003 servers has a fairly small C-partition, which is approaching full. I've had a quick look round using Disktective as to where the space has gone, and a fair bit of it seems to be taken up with…
Simon Hodgson
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Windows Update doesn't work and consumes 100% of CPU (Win7 SP1)

I've observed a strange behaviour with Windows Update (Win7 SP1). The process svchost is consuming an entire core of my Virtual Machine (VirtualBox) doing nothing (i.e., there is no network traffic and the folder C:\Windows\SoftwareDistribution…
cantoni
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How to prevent Windows 10 from restarting the computer after installing updates

This questions has been answered previously, e.g. here, but all the answers I've seen require using a dropdown in Settings> Update & Security> Advanced Options. On my version of Windows 10 Pro, there is no such dropdown: How can I prevent automatic…
Laurent
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With Windows 10 how can I shut down without installing updates?

With Windows 7 it was possible to use the task manager screen to shut down without applying updates (see How to shut down the computer without the update on Windows 7? ). But that did not work for me on Windows 10. How can I shut down Windows 10…
Bryce
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Windows update doesn't progress beyond 0 KB 0%

I have Windows 7 64-bit and the Windows Update isn't working properly. What can I do?
Jader Dias
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Bye Windows Defender, I need to turn you back off again

I am running Windows 10 on a fairly recent laptop. I'm using Avast (free version) as antivirus and before the update, Windows Defender was turned off as it should be in case a third party antivirus is installed. Yesterday I received a notification…
mickkk
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How to get rid of "Updates are available" message in Windows 10?

Today I got the following message: Computer was frozen and the only button available was "Get Updates". I don't need this feature, I need to work, not serve my machine the time she wants. Currently I did cold reboot and had time to open task…
Dims
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