Installing Win 10 updates.

[Dale Gray]

Does Win 10 allow you to install upgrades when you want to, or do they install automatically? Dale.

[Mitch Drumm]

Does Win 10 allow you to install upgrades when you want to, or do they install automatically? Dale.

I assume you are talking about updates as from Windows Update?

I haven't installed 10 and may not for years, but here is the way I understand it:

Those with Win 10 Home and Win 10 Pro can at best DEFER updates, not refuse them forever---subject to the following exception:

Microsoft has a well-hidden troubleshooter package, KB3073930, which supposedly allows you to hide or block Windows Updates and, crucially, driver updates.

I have heard varying reports on how well it works. It's too early to tell.

Excluding that troubleshooter, I think the best you can do is delay updates--for I think 8 months?

I'll continue laying in the weeds and watching for the next 3 months or so. There is some possibility I'll upgrade within 6 months, but the odds are against it. It doesn't offer anything I remotely need, other than support following January 2020, when Windows 7 support ends.

[Jack Stoner]

There aren't too many options.

Here is the option panel in Win 10.

[Dale Gray]

Ok, thanks for the response, also if you install Win 10 and then remove it, can you reinstall it free?

[Jack Stoner]

According to posts on the www.tenforums.com (Windows 10 forum), yes you can upgrade again.

[Mitch Drumm]

Ok, thanks for the response, also if you install Win 10 and then remove it, can you reinstall it free?

Those details remain unclear to some extent.

There is still some confusion about what would happen if you, for instance, do the "free upgrade" of a Win 7 retail license in say November 2015 and then revert to Win 7 in December 2015 and then in 2017 buy entirely new hardware and attempt to get on Win 10 without paying.

So the finer points of reversion, new hardware, and retail licensing carry-over haven't been made clear----particularly AFTER the "free upgrade" period expires next July.

[Jim Cohen]

So, has anyone here installed Win10 yet? I "registered" for a free update and have been receiving pop-ups (pops-up?)that it is now available for me to download and install but I'm not clear on the benefits and risks and whether I would really benefit from doing so. Advice, please?

Thanks,
Jim

[Mitch Drumm]

So, has anyone here installed Win10 yet? I "registered" for a free update and have been receiving pop-ups (pops-up?)that it is now available for me to download and install but I'm not clear on the benefits and risks and whether I would really benefit from doing so. Advice, please?

Thanks,
Jim

Jim:

There's no over-riding reason to move to 10 if you are satisfied with 7 or 8.

Win 7 support will end in Jan 2020, so that date will ultimately come into play.

No reason you can't ignore the "free upgrade" and instead pay for 10 in 2017 or 2019 or just accept it on any new PC you buy over the next few years.

Some are reporting difficulties with moving back to 7 or 8 if they don't like 10.

It remains to be seen how the forced updates thing will work out in the long run. MS has never done that before. You can delay them, but cannot refuse them forever.

If you decide you want the free Win 10, you don't have to rely on that popup mechanism, which would feed it to you through Windows Update. You can get 10 in a more direct manner if you want it at all.

[mtulbert]

I decided to take a chance and update to Windows 10. So far so good. I can tell you that it runs much better on my machine than Windows 7. All software seems to be working perfectly and I have had no issues with it whatsoever. From the time I hit the power switch to being able to do something is about 25 seconds. Once in everything is loading 20 to 30% quicker.

All my audio applications seem to be working just fine and except for a small issue with a Presonus Fader Port and Pro Tools 11 it all works. (Knock on Wood).

BTW my C drive is a Solid State Device which certainly helps with the quick boot time.

[Charlie McDonald]

Advice, please?

Opinion only. I installed Win 10 and rolled back to 8 in a couple of days.
One reason was the lack of choice of how to get updates. There were several other reasons...
... like the way Cortana (who is s/he?) was offering to help all the time gave me the creeps.
Yes, it's so 'powerful'... saving me a half-second here and there. What price speed? And who's after power?

Back on Win 8 I have four updating choices from automatically to not at all (which bracket two 'let me choose' options).
I found increasingly fewer choices with Win10, not a good trend, IMO.

Why would I want to pick up something that 'they' are constantly having to remind me to choose and still remind me? Dnt undrstnd....

[Jack Stoner]

I have no problem with cottana. I Never turned on that function

[Dave Potter]

I installed Win 10 and rolled back to 8 in a couple of days. One reason was the lack of choice of how to get updates.

Eh, I did the same thing first time I tried to install 10. Had some USB issues, but I think I did something that "borked" it. I restored 7 with a drive image I made prior to the 10 install.

But I had second thoughts a few days later, and re-installed 10, sucessfully that time. I've since done it on my laptop without issue, with a 2nd laptop waiting in the wings for the blessed event.

On updates, I'd posit that you're nearly always going to want them anyway, however they're served to you, since they're almost always bug and security fixes, with occasional feature improvements thrown into the mix. If MS issues a poorly-conceived one occasionally, and they do, it's on them to make it right. They will.

The "Cortana" thing? That, like most other Win10 things, are "settable". Change the setting more to your preferences. "She" may even be talking sometimes-I don't know, I don't even have my speakers on. I "just say no".

Like Mark Tulbert said, it IS smoother and faster most times, and with most things. I have found that the driver for my old Roland UA-25 audio interface won't work with Win10, but occasional hardware and software incompatibilities are expected with new OS releases.

Bottom line: They're gonna' get all your bases at the end of the day, anyway. Win10 is inevitable - relax and enjoy it.

[Michael Haselman]

I did this a couple days ago on my desktop, 8.1. Just went "damn the torpedos, full speed ahead." Didn't back up anything or make a restore point. All my music is backed up and nothing on there is priceless. Took about 40 minutes, everything was right where I left it when it was done. I always used the desktop setting anyway. Now if you want to see your "tiles" you click on Start and there they all are in miniature. Very pleased. I'm assuming security is enhanced from 8.1. Malwarebytes was constantly finding these "PUP" files. Hoping they will go away.

[Charlie McDonald]

Bottom line: They're gonna' get all your bases at the end of the day, anyway. Win10 is inevitable - relax and enjoy it.

With my usual dubious thoughts about what the computer has done for us as a species aside, and with a curious yen and a suspicion
that all my base are theirs already--having allowed Microsoft to update automatically again and finding that it's not dropping 10 on me
automatically, I wonder sincerely what the change to 10 has done for anyone personally, what gain it has brought, and whether it's
quantitative or qualitative, because I have a twitchy finger and just might give it another try. The call not to be left behind is powerful.

[Jack Stoner]

Change is always happening with computer hardware and software. If you don't accept the "latest and greatest" you may as well go back to DOS or Windows 95.

There are pluses for a new OS, such as increased security for one. For those that use PC's for recording latency has been reduced. There are those that think this is the last Window OS and just updates from now on.

There has been, in most cases where the PC hardware is compatible, fairly easy upgrade. There are exceptions but not the major snafu that used to occur with new Operating Systems. There are those that have upgraded and found it was a "disaster" but most of those cases the user should not have upgraded to start. If the PC was originally designed for XP and Vista, best to not upgrade (even if the PC was upgraded to Win 7 or Win 8.1 as it was marginally OK on those OS's).