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Win10 1903 Pro Windows Update advanced options — WUH?


Karlston

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Poster's summary: The images are a bit unclear so... Woody says that a W10 Pro 1903 beta build shows the existing maximum 35 day update deferral reduced down to a mere 7 days.

 

Somebody strap me down. I’m about to have a foaming-at-the-mouth episode. The kind only Windows can provide.

 

First, an apology. I’ve been very busy swallowing a whale and haven’t looked at the latest beta test builds of Win10 version 1903 — the version that’s due to go RTM any day now. The builds tend to get very boring at this point — all bug fixes and no interesting new features.

 

Early this morning, I was looking at Windows Update in the latest beta build of Win10 version 1903 Pro. And I’m about to hit the roof.

 

Last time I looked, which was in mid-February, Windows Update had an Advanced Options pane that looked like this:

 

1903-Windows-Update-advanced-options.jpg

 

At the time I noted that MS had banished the “Choose when updates are installed” selection, which is where you specify “Semi-Annual Channel (Targeted)” or “Semi-Annual Channel”. That’s how  you tell Windows 1809 update to keep its mitts off your machine until a new version is declared Ready for Business. Of course, we know that the terminology has changed, and right now we don’t have any idea when/if Microsoft will ever declare Win10 1809 ready for business. That’s a different can of worms, which Susan Bradley talked about in her Monday AskWoody Plus Newsletter 16.8.0 column.

 

But at least we had the “feature update deferral” setting, which is something.

 

I took that screenshot on Feb. 15.

 

Early this morning, while poking around the latest beta release, I found this Advanced Options dialog:

 

1903-Update-advanced-settings.jpg

 

What in the chicken-fired HAIL is going on here?

 

All of the old deferral settings are gone, replaced by a stunted “Pause for 7 days” option.

 

I was expecting that kind of neutering on Win10 1903 Home. Paul Thurrot warned us about it in a Premium article in January:

It is now possible—or, will be possible when Windows 10 19H1 ships—on Windows 10 [Home] to pause Windows Updates for 1 to 7 days.

I filed that in my mind’s “good to know but not terribly helpful” bucket. While this seven day max “Pause” button is better than what Win10 Home has now — which is to say, diddly squat — it’s little more than a fig leaf for the horribly flawed Windows patching juggernaut. As I said in Computerworld last month:

The current beta test version of the next (“19H1” or “1903”) version of Win10 Home includes the ability to Pause updates for seven days. While that’s certainly a step in the right direction, it doesn’t help much in the real world:

  • You can only Pause once, and only for seven days
  • You can’t Pause again without accepting all backed-up updates in the interim
  • You have to know in advance that a bad update is coming down the pike –  there’s no warning

All of which makes Win10 Home “Pause updates” a really nifty marketing setting (“Look! You can pause updates in Win10 Home!”) that’s basically useless. Unless you’re Carnac the Magnificent.

Now, unless I missed something obvious (please tell me if I did!), it looks like Win10 Pro is going to get this same 7-day Pause Updates fig leaf, and the real settings are only accessible in Group Policy (type gpedit.msc, hit Enter, navigate to Computer Configuration >Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Update > Windows Update for Business).

 

1903-Group-Policy-updates.jpg

 

Note that “Semi-Annual Channel” has been neutered — it takes gall to put those settings in a folder called Windows Update for Business — but at least the feature deferral setting is still there.

 

Soooooo…. Is this how 1903 will ship? What happened in the past month? What did I miss? Somebody please help before I start going into paroxysms of Windows Update angst.

 

Again.

 

Source: Win10 1903 Pro Windows Update advanced options — WUH? (AskWoody - Woody Leonhard)

 

Poster's note 2: More details in the comments posted in the above AskWoody link.

 

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Will Microsoft remove Advanced Update options in Windows 10 1903 Pro?

The next feature update for Windows 10 will be released in the coming months. If things go as they look right now, Microsoft may remove advanced update options in the Pro edition of Windows 10 version 1903.

 

If you run Windows 10 Professional version 1809 right now, the current up-to-date version of the operating system, and check out the advanced update settings provided, you will notice options to defer feature and quality updates.

 

Feature updates can be deferred for up to 365 days and quality updates for 30 days right now. A quick check of the advanced update options on a PC running Windows 10 version 1903, an Insider Build, suggests that these options have been removed.

 

In fact, the only option that administrators get right now when they open Windows Update in the Settings application is to pause updates by up to seven days; this is the same time period that Microsoft plans to roll out in Windows 10 Home editions.

 

Below are two screenshots. The first shows the advanced options on a fully patched Windows 10 Pro version 1809 system, the second the advanced options on a recent Insider Build version of Windows 10 version 1903.

windows 10 version 1809 defer updates
Windows 10 version 1809

Windows 10 version 1809 displays options to defer feature and quality updates, and to pause updates.

 

Microsoft introduced these options in the Fall Creators Update in 2017.

 

windows 10 version 1903 advanced update
Windows 10 version 1903

Windows 10 version 1903 displays only one option to control when updates are downloaded and installed on the computer. The option to pause updates is displayed in Windows Update, the advanced options feature a selector to pick a specific day in that 7-day period.

 

In other words: the option to defer updates was removed from Windows Updates in the Settings app completely, the pause option limited to seven days instead of 30 days.

 

Microsoft did announce that it would get rid of the Semi Annual-Channel (Targeted) setting which deferred feature updates by about four months for business users.

Group Policy to the rescue

windows update for business

The removal in the Settings application does not mean that Microsoft removed the options from Pro versions entirely.

 

The Group Policy still lists options to defer and that is where administrators need to go in Windows 10 version 1903 to defer updates.

  1. Open the Start menu.
  2. Type gpedit.msc and hit the Enter-key; this opens the Group Policy Editor.
  3. Go to Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Update > Windows Update for Business
    • Select when Preview Builds and Feature Updates are received -- gives you options to defer feature updates (or preview builds if you run Windows Insider versions).
    • Select when Quality Updates are received -- gives you options to defer quality updates (the cumulative updates that Microsoft releases regularly).

Closing Words

It is unclear why Microsoft is making the change; even Woody is puzzled by this. It is quite possible that Microsoft wanted to sync the settings between Home and Pro editions of Windows 10. Could it have something to do with a recent study that claimed that Windows Update is too complicated?

 

At least some administrators will be puzzled when they don't find the options anymore in the Settings application. Others may involuntarily install updates early because they may not know about the deferral options in the Group Policy or Registry, or third-party tools.

 

Source: Will Microsoft remove Advanced Update options in Windows 10 1903 Pro? (gHacks - Martin Brinkmann)

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