Member Avatar for sneekula

I have an HP notebook with Windows Vista. I slowly got used to the childishness of Vista, but I cannot get used to the surprise upgrades.

You are in the middle of something on the internet, then all of a sudden the program shuts down, the screen goes gray, after a while the OS tells you that you are being upgraded. Finally, the computer reboots, after the usual many minutes of power-up stuff, you are back. You are not in the program you left so abruptly, IE comes up with different settings, and on top of that my router connection has been changed to a neighbors router.

Any way to defeat this Bull, short of getting an iMac?

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  • Latest Post Latest Post by chris5126
Member Avatar for TheNNS

how many times has this happened? only once?

Member Avatar for scru

what's auto-upgrade? Sounds dangerously invasive...

Member Avatar for Infarction

Start -> Control Panel -> Security -> Turn automatic updating on or off, select a setting other than "Install new updates automatically". It's the first thing I do whenever I set up my own box.

commented: surprise upgrades are fixed now, thanks +2
Member Avatar for sneekula

Start -> Control Panel -> Security -> Turn automatic updating on or off, select a setting other than "Install new updates automatically". It's the first thing I do whenever I set up my own box.

Thank you very much! I figured it had to be hidden in there somewhere. My default setting was to upgrade every day at 3AM, but I don't run my computer at 3AM, so it must have picked a random time whenever the computer is running. Well, I turned it off and will check manually for upgrades once a month or so.

Member Avatar for chris5126

that wont work windows have the right to upgrade your software whenever they chose without your knowledge. you accepted this when you read the licence agrement (yer right) as you are actually only buying a licence to use there software not the rights for it. If you have an internet connection they can update whenever the want.

http://windowssecrets.com/2007/09/13/01-Microsoft-updates-Windows-without-users-consent

You can however get around this with clever use of a firewall by blocking the update ipaddresses there is an article on it somewhere cant find it at the mo.

Cheeky buggers hey

commented: Good info -- not may people know about that +20
Member Avatar for TheNNS

why would you want to do that? MS releases new updates and patches for security reasons and you should update your computer with the latest updates.

Member Avatar for chris5126

to be honest i wouldnt i download all updates have caused me no problems and i respect updates that microsoft release. But some dont so it should be up to them.

Member Avatar for TheNNS

the only update i don't download, ever, is the wga piece of junk.

Member Avatar for scru

Isn't that built into Windows Update in Vista. I believe in Vista, without the WGA junk you will not be able to get any other updates.

Member Avatar for chris5126

your right scru but only for optional updates what microsoft class as essential are downloaded and installed even if the o/s isnt geninue with some exceptions. To be honest if people hate vista and microsoft so much use linux or mac o/s

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