22H2 not ready for consumers

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PATCH WATCH By Susan Bradley I don’t like to be an alarmist. Nor do I like to base my technology decisions on one anecdote. But when a friend of mine
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Susan Bradley Patch Lady

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geekdom, lmacri, Kathy Stevens, rc primak, abbodi86, Alex5723

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I also have the refusal to dismount a USB device, in Windows 10, as noted at. And as also noted there, it still doesn’t bother to tell you which program (often it is actually Explorer, if you can actually find anything holding the drive!) As is the case with so many small (or not so small – updates in particular) things with Windows 10, they don’t work as well as Windows 7 did. No sign things are going to get any better with Windows 11 either. They call this progress. Or enhancements. Or something.

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I use to use (discontinued) WD Backup software for updating desktop Edits and Add-Deletes of Explorer folders-files in all my Bkup drives. After switching to Karen’s Replicator (recommended in a Thread here) my Safely Remove release for USB-connected sticks-drives is now almost flawless. A narrow example of no help to you but a sample of how one app can affect your day.

W10 Pro 22H2 / Hm-Stdnt Ofce '16 C2R / HP Envy Desk-Ethernet - SSD-HDD/ i5(8th Gen) 12GB / GP=2 + FtrU=Semi-Annual + Feature Defer = 1 + QU=0

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For Windows, per Susan’s prior newsletter advice, I have my computer’s  Windows Update set and enabled via the Group Policy Editor for Windows 21H2.  Based on my uncaffinated read of today’s newsletter it seemed that she was now advocating using InControl.

Was she really suggesting swapping from the Group Policy Editor, or do I need caffine before I read email and trying to function in the morning?

Thanks.

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Use one or the other, Do not use both GP setting and InControl.
If you choose InControl, go back and remove the TRV=21H2 from GP.

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LHiggins, Fred, John18

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Interesting about the USB Flash Drive in Use issue. I’ve not encountered this issue.

One thing to note about shutting down Windows and then restarting it — Windows does not fully shut down by default. There can be residual configuration and activity items which do not resolve themselves during a normal Windows shutdown and restart.

If I have any doubts about safely removing a USB device from Windows, I shut down everything, turn off the power switch on the PC, and then remove the device. Then restart Windows. Never had any system crashes or other issues when doing things this way.

On a laptop or other battery powered device, the only to achieve this effect is to either remove the battery, or else go into Power Management and turn off Fast Startup in the Advanced Options. Then Windows will truly shut down, and the safe removal can be completed. Never seen this method fail.

I dual-booted for years with Windows and Linux. If I wanted to share an NTFS data partition, I had to permanently disable Windows Fast Startup because it locked up the state of the data partition, making it unavailable to Linux for writing data. This a related issue to the USB Safe Removal bug, I believe.

In any event, the Task Manager should not lock up a USB device. Certainly not in a way which survives a restart. And for sure not in a way which can corrupt the Windows system. Microsoft needs to patch this issue.

That said, I don’t find anything in the 22H2 Feature Update which would cause me not to recommend it. Unless you have incompatible drivers, that is.

-- rc primak

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bbearren, mulletback

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rc primak wrote:

Interesting about the USB Flash Drive in Use issue. I’ve not encountered this issue.

Nor have I.  In File Explorer left pane, right-click the USB drive, select “Eject”, the drive disappears from File Explorer and I remove it from the USB port.

I have dual booted Windows/Windows for decades.  I am an inveterate tinkerer of Windows OS innards, and very early on used a “Parallel Installation” of Windows as suggested in a Microsoft diagnosis/repair post in the days of XP to repair a pooched XP.  Following that advice (the parallel installation was intended to be only temporary in order to rectify issues with the installed OS) I found that in my experience there is no better repair tool for Windows than a parallel (dual boot) installation of Windows, I bought another license to dual boot Windows and have been dual booting ever since.

Once Windows 8 introduced Fast Startup, I disabled it, and there is no hiberfil.sys on either installation (powercfg /hibernate off).  Perhaps my system setup has eliminated the opportunity for USB drive removal problems, but I’ve been on 22H2 since it was released without any issues.  Everything just works.

 

Create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates, in case you need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do. We don't all have to do the same things.

Computer Specs

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rbailin

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I agree on disabling “Fast Startup” on all my Win10 & Win11 pc’s. The few seconds you save during bootup are inconsequential compared to the disaster awaiting your disk storage if you boot from another o/s on the same system or have to move that disk to a different system. At least Windows now respects and maintains your Fast Startup choice during release upgrades.

Remember that, with Fast Startup enabled, system shutdown and then restarting the system is not the same as using Restart, which bypasses Fast Startup.

I’ve also resorted to using the Eject option when trying to remove USB drives. Win11 and new installations of Win10 usually allow you to remove the drive from the USB system tray icon, but that’s seldom true with systems which have gone thru several upgrades. Eject always works, but the Explorer window doesn’t close for that drive until you physically remove the drive, and one has to wonder what happens if you try to continue to reference files on a drive that has been ejected but not removed.

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rbailin wrote:

Eject always works, but the Explorer window doesn’t close for that drive until you physically remove the drive

I haven’t encountered that behavior, either.  There are only two ‘USB drive Eject’ scenarios that I have experienced.  If I have the contents of the USB drive displayed in the right pane, Eject ejects the drive and also closes File Explorer.

If I first change the focus of File Explorer by selecting “This PC”, then Eject the USB drive, only the USB drive disappears from the left pane, but File Explorer remains open with the contents of “This PC” displayed in the right pane.

Create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates, in case you need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do. We don't all have to do the same things.

Computer Specs

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We will be taking delivery of a new Windows 11 HP workstation shortly.  It shipped November 11.

What we do not know is if it shipped with Windows 11 Pro 21H2 or 22H2.

If it is delivered with 22H2, how do we roll it back to 21H2 without losing the software and drivers that shipped with the new system?

The first thing we will do, once Windows is up and running, will be to clone the PC’s 256 GB SSD onto an external drive as well as an internal 2 TB SSD.

The second thing we will do is remove the 256 GB SSD and put it away for safe keeping and replace it with the cloned 2 TB SSD.

That said, we may still need to rollback windows 11 from 22H2 to 21H2 on the cloned 2 TB SSD.

An alternative is to just live with 22H2 and hope for the best.

Any thoughts on how to proceed?

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Kathy Stevens wrote:

That said, we may still need to rollback windows 11 from 22H2 to 21H2 on the cloned 2 TB SSD. An alternative is to just live with 22H2 and hope for the best. Any thoughts on how to proceed?

Windows 11  21H2 and 22H2 are different animals.  I believe that it’s possible to shim 21H2 into installation media for 22H2 (as I did to install Windows 11 on unsupported hardware), but I haven’t tried it.

Create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates, in case you need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do. We don't all have to do the same things.

Computer Specs

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Kathy Stevens

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speaking of 22H2 being not ready, Microsoft is set to relax or remove some restrictions in mid-November and make 22H2 “more ready” (ah the opposite of “not ready”) for eligible devices

I was reading this article from Computerworld:
https://www.computerworld.com/article/3675334/windows-11-22h2-is-out-so-why-isnt-your-pc-getting-it.html

Susan has a Surface Pro 7 plus running Win11 21H2 that isn’t getting the 22H2 update due to a upgrade block with a printer that uses Microsoft IPP Class Driver or Universal Print Class Driver.

well Microsoft is set to “remove” that safeguard pretty soon as they said so:

Next steps: We are working on a resolution and estimate the safeguard will be removed in mid-November.

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Win11Pro 22H2.22621.819
If you have the new tabbed CMD prompt, you may need the legacy CMD prompt (or the legacy console).

• Open the CMD prompt (I used run as administrator)
• Right-click “Administrator: Command Prompt” upper bar
• Select Properties
• Check Use legacy console

I needed the legacy console and this information was not obvious.

Source:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/console/legacymode

Carpe Diem {with backup and coffee}
offline▸ Win10Pro 2004.19041.572 x64 i3-3220 RAM8GB HDD Firefox83.0b3 WindowsDefender
offline▸ Acer TravelMate P215-52 RAM8GB Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1265 x64 i5-10210U SSD Firefox106.0 MicrosoftDefender
online▸ Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1413 x64 i5-9400 RAM16GB HDD Firefox112.0b3 MicrosoftDefender

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The default in Windows 11 is Windows Terminal. You need to change it to the Windows Console Host first or run conhost.exe.

--Joe

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