Wednesdays releases: KB 2952664, 2976978, 2977759

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Guess that writing on the book has rolled over my brain – or I’m just getting lazy. You wouldn’t believe how many changes there are in build 1607. Any
[See the full post at: Wednesdays releases: KB 2952664, 2976978, 2977759]

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@Woody,

Now I’m sitting with two, Optional, unchecked KB 2952664’s. One from 4/12/16 and one from 6/8/16.

Oddly, the 4/12/16 is italicized, and “Recommended”, while the 6/8/16 is not italicized.

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Interesting fact: On my computer, there’s currently two different versions of KB 2952664 – the old one from April, which is still a recommended update, and this new version, labeled as optional.

They have different sizes too – old one is 4,6 MB, new one says “4,6 – 4,7 MB”.

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After reading the above I went looking. It appears
I hid the first KB2952664 on the 11th April 16….
which was in Optional unchecked and non-italic (meaning MS recommended) and now it appears again
in the same manner – Optional unchecked and non-italic… both with the same file sizes as MK.
So at least MS is being consistent! Ha! LT

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When in doubt hit the update with GWX Control Panel.

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Hi Woody,

Recently you discussed the excruciating slowness with which “Check for Updates” was running. Perhaps in response, Microsoft seems to have sped up the process. As of this latest group of patches, “Check for Updates” is running normally. Now what is slow is the download. I know you install only security updates, but for those of us anal-compulsives who install optional packages, MS seems to be metering the outflow. Now download speeds are excruciatingly slow. I have fast internet connections, but this latest group of Office 2013 updates (639mb) took nearly 20 minutes to download per machine. Normally that would take three to five minutes. I’m wondering if MS has metered bandwidth for other-than-Windows-10 downloads.

GaryK

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On my Win8.1 x64 home edition laptop I had 2976978 in hidden & optional. So I unhid the hidden one so I could compare the two.

Sure enough, one has a publish date of 041216 italicized/recommended 3.1 MB. The other dated 060816 unitalicized 3.4 MB. Both listed as optional.

http://i.imgur.com/8APtg4P.png

For now I’m going to leave both of these unhidden to see if ch100’s comment about not hiding pans out. I have a sneaky suspicion that it won’t matter as the system would most likely find the older one & remove it somehow. I’ve had others hidden, unhidden & installed do that. Such is the weirdness of M$. Maybe if left unhidden it’ll just go away faster.

3035583 did a similar duplication thing to me after the DEFCON 3 installs on 053016. One of which went away 060716 after my hidden updates debacle, heh heh.

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It’s possible that their servers are slowing due to the strain. Very hard to say. Certainly Office 2013 patches are not the highest priority…

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There may be throttling too, which is not unusual when the servers are under load. Windows 10 with Office any version would all download and install in the next few days after the release of the patches which may explain higher load. This is mostly outside of the end-user control, unless taking special action, which is not the case for most end-users.
As Woody says, at least few more days of waiting for the recent Office releases would not do any harm.

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Thanks for trusting my comments 🙂 The system has no (normal) way to remove the old one if it is hidden. This is why I keep saying not to hide the old ones, as they are left in an inconsistent state in the database after being removed from the servers. How much this matters in practice is very hard to measure.
Coming back to your screen, one of them has a note saying Recommended which is not the same with Optional. Recommended is rather in the middle for those considered Important and those considered Optional. If a certain box is ticked in your WU client, the Recommended suddenly becomes Important without you being able to distinguish between the Recommended and those which are Important for real.
As I said in an email sent to Woody which he posted since, I suspect that the currently Optional one (the one which is more recent) will soon become Recommended, while the old one will be expired, which is the same with pulled or retired, from the Microsoft servers at the same time.

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“If a certain box is ticked in your WU client, the Recommended suddenly becomes Important without you being able to distinguish between the Recommended and those which are Important for real.”

That setting in WU is left unchecked, per Woody’s DEFCON 3 instructions.

Thankfully I keep a list that tells me which ones not to install & minimizes the indistinguishable nature you refer to.

With all this nonsense, I have had updates disappear from many locations, hidden & unhidden. I’m beginning to think it may not really matter because if M$ wants to tamper with one, they most certainly will. However, it certainly makes more sense to not even “have” the ability to hide updates if their crumby system can’t see one that needs revision, pulling or retiring.

This experiment with this one update will continue, just to see how it finishes out.

Thanks for the feedback ch100.

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It should not be a problem with not installing Recommended updates under “normal” conditions as per Woody’s recommendations.
The issue is that in the last year or so, Microsoft added a certain degree of fluidity between different categories of updates and the separation is not so definite now. Many updates are originally released as true Optional and after a month or few months they move under Important, which makes sense as this means that they have passed the test of time, while those updates were always meant to become Important. This is the case with many Windows Update client updates. It was until about December 2014 the case with Windows 8.1 and 2012 R2 Cumulative Updates.
On the other hand, I believe that many of the Recommended updates bring new functionality which is useful and this is the reason why I decided in favour of installing them.
About 1 year ago I was following the same guidelines that Woody has, i.e not installing anything else other than Important Updates. Since then, Microsoft changed the rules though.

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I waited five days. Still excruciatingly slow, and this is true on multiple sites.

GaryK

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“and after a month or few months they move under Important, which makes sense as this means that they have passed the test of time”

What you’re really saying here is that MS have off-loaded the beta-testing process onto us.

GaryK

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That’ correct – and it’s even more dire with Windows 10.

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A moment ago I checked this out. Duplication is gone & the one left is the older one 041216, odd. Ran the updater & the date is now “yesterday.”

Gotta love me some M$. Perhaps this is old hat to some of the more seasoned posters here. To me it’s a mix of weird & educational.

Does this mean I’ll unhide the rest? Not sure, too soon to tell. Might be closer though, heh heh.

Experiment complete, thanks for playing.

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It’s pretty funny how Microsoft has pushed these updates out so often, I actually have the one for my operating system memorized. As soon as I saw that set of seven numbers, I was like, “Waaait a second…”

I do appreciate the fact they’re optional, though. This may not be the case next month, since the free upgrade offer for Windows 10 expires on the 29th. But who can say?

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I… I’m sorry but…
I just couldn’t pass this up… **snickers**

https://youtu.be/c4OS17lqHiE

XD

So far I’ve counted 5 times written about them at IW and 8 times here… but I’m not done looking yet.

Good job keeping track of the chaos! I sincerely thank you and all of your awesome followers for doing what you do.
Without you many, many, many (^16 (^16,777,216 (?))) of us would have been lost to the wolves long ago…

in a galaxy far, far away…

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