For anyone who wants to do this, use Kill Windows Update. It's simple. and it works. There's several million reasons why conventional wisdom demands that you NOT do it, but I don't give a fuck and if you don't either, then this program is for you.
this post was submitted on 13 Jan 2024
549 points (96.1% liked)
Memes
45595 readers
1236 users here now
Rules:
- Be civil and nice.
- Try not to excessively repost, as a rule of thumb, wait at least 2 months to do it if you have to.
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
Gotta give this one a try!
You really shouldn’t
I don't keep nuclear secrets on my PC, but sometimes I run tasks that take days to process, and Windows updates have fucked me more than once.
Updates patch major security vulnerabilities. It’s cute that you think nuclear secrets existing in your hard drive are the only reason why you should care if your PC is infected with malware but it isn’t. Malware can steal your keystrokes, granting attackers access to your bank accounts and every other place you sign into online. Malware also uses background processes to do bad things, so your “multi-day” processes will take even longer when your computers resources are being hogged by nasty stuff.
A machine sitting there quietly crunching numbers isn't going to get infected unless your firewall is wide open, and if it is then correcting that is far more important than installing the latest Windows updates
load more comments
(1 replies)
load more comments
(3 replies)
Should have installed Linux instead
I do use linux mint for basic stuff, bit I am a complete noob and can’t figure out how to get Altstore on it, not that it matters because it hasn’t been updated in 2 years for Linux
load more comments
(9 replies)
At this point I just accept that my windows desktop is going to reboot itself and update itself every fucking night. I used to be able to leave it on for months at a time only rebooting when I felt like it and had prepared all of my open projects to be rebooted.
Now I do those projects on my Linux PC, which has to be a separate PC now because the windows updates completely screw up dual booting. Microsoft is such a shit show, I would probably only turn on that PC on the weekends except I need Windows for work.
Put a second hard drive In your PC and install Linux solely to it. Then you can use your BIOS boot menu to choose which OS to boot and Windows can't wreck GRUB when updating.
I thought that too. My (now windows only) computer has two M2 slots, I used one for Linux and one for Windows. One day I walked into my office having left windows running the night before and my computer had rebooted and updated, The first thing I did was try to boot into the Linux partition and it did not work.
Not taking that chance again, I now have two separate PCs on my desk.
Hmm. That's interesting. The only thing I can think of that could potentially cause that is if for whatever reason there was an exisitng EFI partition on your linux drive. Windows will use whatever EFI it sees even if it's on a separate drive from it's primary NTFS partition. As you can imagine this can cause some fucky stuff to happen.
Some instructions I've read for dual booting recommend installing Linux first, removing the SSD wit Linux on it from the computer, and then install Windows to prevent that from happening.
It's really shitty that users have to go through all that trouble, though.
You're the reason Microsoft has to force it on the rest of us.
Everyone would still be able to shut down without updating, if people actually rebooted once in a while when Windows asked. Instead of leaving it in a perpetual sleep cycle of multiple years, and then blaming Microsoft when things go tits up.
At least the Pro version is still able to do so, since then the user can blame the IT department instead.
I think you mean Enterprise? I don’t believe Pro allows you to completely disable auto updates. Furthest I think you can do is turn them off for at most 2 weeks?
Unless you mean with group policies or disabling services, which I believe is still possible even in Home.
Setting up a GPO with WSUS to localhost will disable updates. But please don't do that. As much as I hate updates, they're very important.
Agreed, and I say that in every one of these discussions. :)
The only time auto updates should be disabled is on machines with an uptime requirement, which should have regularly scheduled maintenance which includes updating their software. And of course any critical security updates should be installed asap even if it’s outside the normal maintenance window.
load more comments
(1 replies)
load more comments
(1 replies)
OP is a horrible person and I hate him
The computer ain't gonna tell me when to restart. I decide that, not it. And it's not getting regular restarts. Hell, my phone bugs me about restarting after i don't do it for a month, and the fucking notification won't fuck off. Can't bloody stand it
load more comments
(2 replies)
load more comments
(1 replies)
I never shut down or restart my computer. Then some mornings I find that Windows decided to automatically restart my computer anyway. I lost a lot of unsaved notes that way.
That's a you problem. Don't blame windows for shitty practices.
To be fair, it would also be highly distruptive if you let the computer run overnight to finish some long running job and Windows decides it's rebootin' time. The point is: the OS shouldn't decide for you to reboot.
load more comments
(3 replies)
Like using Windows
Ackshually you still can blame Windows for not supporting live updates.
load more comments
(4 replies)
… why exactly are you leaving unsaved work open on your PC and expecting it to be there the next day? And it seems it’s intentional? Think of all the things that could lose the work apart from an update. A power outage, a brownout, a failed PC component; memory corruption, and more.
It's was just notes, not work work (that's all in the cloud). And yes,I expect things to be there the next day, it's been decades since I was working on a 2x86 with a bad hard drive that froze ar random intervals, so I had to save every few seconds. I do save even my random notes now, just in case, but if they get closes I will probably forget about them because the whole point is to have them on screen as reminders.
It's weird how being forced to restart your computer by the OS is obviously a new feature yet people defend it so religiously.
I don't understand why people care so much? It's like people that don't want to keep their PCs running always feel better about themselves for using their PC the way the OS forces them to?
I miss the days of if you don't have something nice to say just stfu. Now, it's if you don't say anything to put them down, how will you feel better about yourself?
Eh… This was more of a comment on “why aren’t you saving your work” which has been a push point since the dawn of computers.
That said, forced updates and restarts aren’t a bad thing. They should be defended to an extent. You don’t remember the days of virtually every consumer PC being months behind on security updates? Viruses running rampant?
The feature can be bypassed by the users who actually care. Yes, with “a lot of” work to intentionally prevent non-power users from just flipping the bit and going back to a world of un-updated boxes of vulnerability.
load more comments
(2 replies)
I'm sorry that you've lost so much work. Although it's kind of irresponsible to leave unsaved work open overnight. Perhaps you could look into applications that have an autosave feature? Alternativly if your workflow permits it do your work on the cloud?
I do my actual work in the cloud. But when I want to just jut down quick notes I open a Notepad window and write them there. Usually it's something I need to remember for just a few hours later. Sometimes it's something I'll be expanding on somewhere permanent later on. It's just the most handy place to write something down quickly. Sometimes I have one such window open, sometimes I end up with 6. I just so happened that night I had some more important notes that I didn't transfer yet. I've got into the habit of saving them now just in case, so I have tons of small text files that I'll probably forget about.
load more comments
(2 replies)
load more comments
(4 replies)
I'm in two minds about this. On the one hand, philosophically, the user should be in charge of their PC, and updates should happen at a time of their choosing.
On the other hand, people are idiots. Especially the type of people who think they know everything but in reality don't. The type that will search for registry hacks or scripts that disable updates, and proceed to live without any security patches, putting not only their own system/data at risk, but others too.
It's probably a necessary evil that MS forces security patches on users.
What isn't so forgivable is them pushing all the other crap on people, or why the updates take so fucking long on shutdown/startup. That's what they need to improve. Far fewer people would care about avoiding updates if a reboot after an update was imperceptibly different to any normal startup, like it is on Linux.
MS is a $3tn company. They can achieve this if they want to, but they see spending money on Windows as a waste of money - why improve something when you've already cornered the market? It doesn't benefit them. It doesn't make them more money. Windows is dominant either way, they get their licensing fees either way. Improving Windows damages Microsoft.
Linux superiority.
view more: next ›