Dear Jordan
Further research has yielded several programs that aim to control
windows updates in Windows 10 (and 7). The most interesting appear to
be Windows Update Mini Tool (WUMT) and Windows Update Manager (WUMGR)
which take over from Windows Update, allowing choice about which updates
to accept and which to reject. WUMT is no longer updated but appears to
function still. WUMGR is still maintained. Further control can be
taken with a script called Sledgehammer:
https://www.ghacks.net/2019/04/28/control-windows-updates-with-sledgehammer-formerly-wumt-wrapper-script/
This will switch off Windows Updates except when they are wanted. It
also carries out a few other changes to prevent Windows 10 switching
them back on. There is also a little utility called Windows Update
Blocker (WUB) which offers a simple way of enabling and disabling the
Windows Update Service.
I have installed WUB and WUMT onto my Windows 7 system and they seem to
do what they claim to do. Windows 10 is a more dangerous creation but
using these tools, it does appear possible to take control of updates
again (to an extent anyway).
Paul
On 30/07/2019 23:07, J R FOX wrote:
Paul,
In terms of what I'm aware of, I think "Anti-Beacon"
(possibly free ?), from the Spybot anti-spyware folks,
may have been the pioneer in this category. There
seem to be a number of other contenders now.
I also recall various internet-published articles warning
that "taming" Win-10s worst proclivities would would
result in fatally compromising the OS, in one way or
another. But that could easily have been alarmist spin --
I don't know. Since I have a spare box or two to
experiment with, and can clone HDDs against major
setbacks, I hope to put it to the test. Supposedly,
this includes ways of escaping / controlling the
auto-updates you can't otherwise evade, unless you
have the Enterprise version. (I am personally more
interested in the "LTSB" track that does not make any
major changes for a couple years.)
Good places to research this creative tampering would
likely include Wilders and InfoWorld.
Some time ago, our own Flash published a laundry list here
of things one needs to shut down in order to regain user
control. That was taking a very piecemeal, Do It Yourself
approach. These automate-the-process-for-you programs
seem more appealing, provided that they work and are
essentially non-damaging to Win-10.
I'd certainly like to hear his current wisdom on the subject,
with the benefit of a couple years more experience behind it.
Jordan
On Tuesday, July 30, 2019, 7:45:23 AM PDT, Paul Breeze
<dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
(PS. Should have read this more closely; effective appears too often.)
Following Carl's message a couple of weeks ago, I too have been looking
at Windows 10. I could not upgrade my version of Windows 7 but after a
clean install I was able to buy a pro licence for about £2 on Ebay. This
new OS is on a new hard disk so that I can swap it in and out with my
active Windows 7 system.
I now have a working version of Windows 10. I would like to contain its
ability to send data back to Microsoft. There are various programs that
try to do this but I have no idea how effective they are. The one I
have installed is called WPD. It appears to be comprehensive but I have
no way of testing how effective it is. Does anybody else have any
experience of this, or of trying to control Windows 10 by any other
means. There seems to be a community interested in making Windows 10
private and I would be happy to go down this route if I knew that it was
effective.
Paul