Well, yeah, I have it around for gaming, but a reboot right in the middle of a bossfight is gonna lead to a whole new class of angry nerd-rage videos on youtube (try convincing gamers that there are specific times to use their rigs, and forget about ‘just one more try at that bit where I’m stuck’…).
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The easiest way to get your feet wet is to put a Linux distro on a USB stick and boot off of it.
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When you render computer animation your inactive hours are your most active hours.
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Actual translation: “We at Microsoft are tired of being blamed for poor security when people refuse to install updates. We’re fixing the glitch.”
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Fair enough. In a case like yours, I’d strongly recommend putting a reminder on your calendar for the second Tuesday of every month so you can proactively install updates at a time that works for you rather than waiting for the automatic check.
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Or using an OS where updates don’t b0rk everything while they’re happening.
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thanks. i was gonna say the only times it has ‘automagically rebooted’ was when i left my machine running overnight cause i knew it was gonna get updated.
every other time i get a pop up asking whether i wanna do it now or postpone it. just like xp did and 7 did.
it does run updates in the background while i am working on it because i usually put the laptop to sleep overnight so it has to check sometime.
also for all those moaning about the forced updates you haven’t had to fix someone else’s totally b0rk3d box that would have been just fine if they kept their security patches updated. as annoying as it is i can totally see where microsoft is coming from on this one.
ETA from the linked howtogeek article above
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Notify the user before a shutdown that the update will be applied at the next restart.
Don’t restart my computer.
It’s MY computer, Microsoft has no business reaching out to decide how I use it.
All the stories people relay about “Oh, it notifies you and lets your delay things” are bs garbage platitudes offered by people who are casual users of technology.
When a MS update shows up at 10pm after I’ve gone to bed, and then applies itself 4 hours later, they’ve taken the ‘choice’ out of my day. If it shows up at 10am for 60 seconds down in the notification bar while I’m on the phone and distracted - or even just looking at one of my other 3 4K screens, and I don’t see it, it will automatically reboot right in the middle of my day.
If I have incognito windows open to test a client site and I leave to get some shut eye, coming back and discovering they’re just gone in the morning is a slap in the face. Yes, I could write down all my sites, take snapshots of all my open notpad docs, duplicate all the temporary files I’m editing on remote servers, but why - all so that idiots who have been told a hundred times not to but can’t help clicking on that PDF in their email have immeasurably more secure?
Yes yes, herd immunity. Whatever. I do not subscribe to the notion that Microsoft or any other company has any business telling me what to do with something that I own. This computer is mine. Keep your grimy hands off.
BTW - the link posted elsewhere in here to this:
http://www.howtogeek.com/224471/how-to-prevent-windows-10-from-automatically-downloading-updates/
Of those options, the only one that really works is the Registry Edit on the Pro versions. Once I finally got that done, Windows now treats my computer appropriately - it pops up a window asking me to update, I allow it to show me what’s on deck, and then I dismiss it until the weekend when I have time to sit down and read Boing Boing or reboot my computer - at my choice.
Since applying that, I’ve never had it reboot without my permission.
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Actually, it’s the botnet’s computer.
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One easy fix it to disable the rebooting which is done with a scheduled task.
Make a batch file with this command:
schtasks /change /tn \Microsoft\Windows\UpdateOrchestrator\Reboot /DISABLE
Than set that file as a scheduled task running as admin to run once a day or so and it should force you into a reboot.
You can also just run that from an admin level command prompt when it it talking about updates.
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This is entirely contingent on your something serious being possible or practical (or even desirable) on something else. My something serious is video and audio work. Macs are increasingly under-powered given the price, and as such are slowly disappearing from professional video settings. Their presence in often relegated to certain software that is Mac only. As for Linux? I’ve never once in my life seen a Linux box used as a workstation in audio or video. Not even in non-professional settings. The vast majority of the professional grade software is not available on Linux. And Linux’s various quirks would make it unwise even if there was proper software available.
That’s the issue here. Not automatic updates. I’ve never once been bitten by the forced updates, and know very few people who have. But the scheduling is far too limited. We used to be able to set a specific time, or a narrow time window. For each individual update cycle. Now we get to set a 12 hour window where updates might happen.
There have certainly been times where I needed my PC to keep operating, in active use or otherwise for more than 12 hours. They need to put a more comprehensive scheduler in there. And allow “active hours” settings longer than 12 hours.
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That’s standard practice in the industry.
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Not to mention scientists who also use computers to, you know, actually compute things rather than just using them as fancy typewriters. I almost always have a several-hour to several-days process or two going on all my computers. Which means I tend to stick to Linux and Macs where possible, but it is clear with the Ubuntu compatibility layer that Windows 10 offers that Microsoft is trying to attract serious users now. Which means having computers reboot while unattended is completely unacceptable behavior. On other systems everything short of a complete kernel update can be done without a reboot.
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The “Don’t reboot with a logged-in user” one? I haven’t checked yet, but I think the last update reversed my change.
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They wouldn’t be using home edition though (I would hope not anyway)… professional lets you set a specific window for updates. Also in any largeish environment there should be an in house update server pushing out patches to the workstations rather than having them check in with Redmond as well as controlling the workstation setting with group policy.
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Bravo 
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This one:
Use Group Policy to Disable Automatic Updates (Professional Editions Only)
After tweaking that, it still pops up once a day, sometimes twice, but it’s just a notification window that opens up the control panel for windows update, listing the options. It’s perfect. If Windows defender has an update (which it seems like is every other day) I can choose to make an informed decision to skip it.
If flash is pending an update, I can decide if I’m ready to change it now, or tomorrow, and not worry about Windows resetting everything while I take a call from a client or swing out to the store to get some milk.
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What do you expect from an OS that popped up constant boxes “suggesting” that people upgrade to Windows 10, then if that didn’t work, just installed itself automatically with no opt-out? I had to roll back my system updates to before the whole Windows 10 thing even started and freeze them there forever to avoid having this happen to me. The way Windows 10 was forced on people with such ruthlessness also makes me suspicious that there’s some kind of spyware in there that higher powers are trying to make mandatory for most computer users.
Why don’t I use Linux? Game compatibility. That’s the only reason.
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Which one do you think they’re going to? Linux? They’re going to buy new hardware and go to OS X?
It isn’t hard to install. To actually use, day to day, for most folks…
Linux is great if you want to use Linux apps available (and only those) or compile your own kernel.
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