A possible solution to the forced “Upgrade to Windows 10” Windows Update dialog?

In my earlier post, I asked for ideas about blocking the Windows 10 upgrade from Win 7 or Win 8.1, in a very late stage. For most people, running GWX Control Panel from Josh Mayfield will keep Win 7 or 8.1 from installing Windows 10. However, it doesn’t work for everybody. In particular, people in a very late stage of the Windows 10 forced march will see the dialog shown here whenever they go into Windows Update. It’s scary because it looks like you have no option except to install Windows 10.

Two of you kindly chimed in with a possible solution. If you’re currently in the late stage – you see this dialog box in Windows Update – I’d like you to verify if this works for you.

Per reader Erik:

When I try to download and install updates, I get a downloading Windows 10 progress bar. However, it doesn’t download Windows 10. It actually downloads the updates I selected and installs them, but it doesn’t have the status bar (1 of 12 etc). So functionally it does work like it should, but cosmetically it looks like it downloads and installs Windows 10.

Reader DeWayne:

So as an experiment I unchecked all the updates and picked a small one clicked download. Downloading Windows 10 came on screen I watched for about 30 sec and it changed to updating. When I rebooted WU correctly identified a small critical update as installed. I went ahead and checked the critical updates available and installed and confirmed nothing related to Windows 10 was installed. But every since all WU updates the screen displays downloading Windows 10

That’s a tremendous (and reassuring!) discovery, if I can get it confirmed on enough machines.

If you have a Win7 or Win 8.1 machine that’s stuck in the “Upgrade to Windows 10” dialog – the one shown here – could you do me (and about a million other people) a huge favor?

Click on the link to Show all available updates.

Check the box on one of the updates.

Uncheck the box that says “Upgrade to Windows 10”

Install updates.

Your machine should show that it’s installing Windows 10 – but in a minute or two or three, it’ll come back showing that it’s installed the one update you selected, and not the Windows 10 update. It may even show that one of the selected installations has failed – the Windows 10 update.

(If the update goes on for more than a few minutes, the experiment failed – Cancel the update.)

LarryH, on a separate thread, reported something similar. I’ve asked Larry to drop by here and see if this synopsis accurately reflects what happened to him.

If you’re stuck in the final stages, or know someone who is, could you have them try this approach and see if it works?