Word to the Win10 wise: Don’t click “Check for Updates”

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It’s like deja vu all over again. Microsoft pulled the Seeker stunt — upgrading Win10 machines to the latest version on a “Check for updates” — when
[See the full post at: Word to the Win10 wise: Don’t click “Check for Updates”]

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abbodi86, Elly, geekdom

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How do they get away with this stuff?

Who is going to stop them? People can choose to seek alternatives to Windows, but not many people will, because they don’t know what is out there, and because Apple is about the only truly viable alternative.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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Bill C., bknight721

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I’ve found my alternative too and it was inspired by your Group “L” tag at the end of your posts.

I’m personally tired of feeling like I have to fight Microsoft for control of my machine every time I boot it up. I created Group “K” for myself. Kubuntu with Windows 10 Pro Dual Boot. I configured the GRUB bootloader to default to Kubuntu. I have to manually choose Windows and I only go there for my Visual Studio projects and one specific app that I wrote for myself several years ago to organize healthcare information.

Group "L": Linux Mint dual-booting Windows 10 Pro.

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MrJimPhelps, Cybertooth, Bill C., radosuaf

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I too am not pleased with this, however, they have included it in their Windows 10 EULA. Do not like the EULA, do not use it.

It would be nice if mega-corporations could be complained, shamed, cajoled, wheedled, winged and sued, but if they are for all extents and purposes in a monopolistic position, it is their way or the highway. It is even more futile if you are a segment of their customer base who are not revenue generating (at least not directly – YET!). MS has nothing but paternalistic contempt for the home user. Those users serve only a bragging rights for how fast the “best Windows yet” is being adopted, and as beta tester for the revenue generating target audience, the enterprises. Even the word adopted is suspect since when was the last time you saw a full featured laptop or desktop, other than Apple to choose from. Chromebooks to me are not really full featured as they are not truely offline devices.

Unfortunately, Linux OEM is a rare bird. People want simple and easy. I find Linux installs relatively easy, but too the vast majority of folks I know who use a PC, the concept of actually installing an OS is terrifying, so they buy what is available and often low cost is a driver.

There is only one master MS listens to and that is Wall Street stock prices and value.

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IME deferrals are still being honored, so why the clickbait title?

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Because

1. Microsoft has not said, unequivocally, that it will continue to honor the blocking method, especially for those on Win10 home.

2. With the 1803 upgrade, on three separate, documented occasions, Microsoft” “forgot” to honor the settings on Pro.

3. Who owns my machine, anyway?

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RamRod, lurks about

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Microsoft has no blocking method for Windows 10 Home:

Also, some updates for Windows won’t be installed automatically.

Metered connections in Windows 10

Who owns the operating system, anyway?

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Precisely. There’s no promise — no description — from Microsoft about blocking Win10 Home pushed upgrades with Metered Connections, or anything else for that matter.

If version upgrades came in smooth and easy, we’d have no argument. But that’s never happened.

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zero2dash

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woody wrote:

If version upgrades came in smooth and easy, we’d have no argument. But that’s never happened.

The vast majority of version upgrades come in smooth and easy (or 90% would not be using 1803).

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no “official” method of blocking updates on Win10 home – not without resorting to 3rd party tools like StopWinUpdates and Windows Update Blocker

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Within the EU, the practices of Microsoft might not be allowed anymore under the new consumer protection laws. In other word: Microsoft is probably sitting on a ticking time bomb. Big chance though, that they will ignore the law too.

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Microsoft gets away with it because we tolerate it every time we buy a Windows computer.

Stop buying Windows and maybe Microsoft will get  the idea and give the customers what they want and not what Microsoft wants.

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anonymous wrote:

Microsoft gets away with it because we tolerate it every time we buy a Windows computer.

That’s true, but it’s easier said than done when it comes to buying a computer.  If you’re talking about desktops, just build one… easy (really, it is), or find someone who will, and don’t buy Windows.  Laptops, though, are harder to come by without Windows on them.  I had a hard enough time selecting a model that ticked all the boxes even with Windows on it!

My solution, of course, is to not use Windows (10).  Sure, I am contributing to the enrichment of Microsoft and encouraging them to keep doing what they are doing when I buy a PC and then wipe Windows to put on something more appropriate, but at the moment I do that, it stops mattering to me, in terms of my own PC usage, what Microsoft is doing and whether they can be made to stop it.  It no longer makes any difference, other than that I am offended by bad behavior in general and that I am sympathetic to those millions of people who don’t know there are alternatives or that are not able to make use of them because of the lock-in effect.

My new PC becomes truly “mine” only when Windows 10 is gone, and it’s no more expensive to me– Chromebooks with the same specs as my last two laptop purchases don’t cost any more than the Windows ones I bought, and while MS got the license fees that Dell and Acer respectively paid them (offset by the subsidy the bloatware sellers paid the hardware OEMs to include more junk I also deleted), they don’t get the telemetry telling them that I am number 700 million and one.  They don’t get to use me to beta test their software or force me into Bing searches with sponsored links when I just want to search my PC locally.  They can’t ply me with ads or make “apps” that tie into their cloud services unremovable in one of an endless series of moves to monetize me against my will for as long as I am willing to take it.  They don’t get my contribution to the NetMarketShare or StatCounter numbers that show Windows 10 creeping up on or exceeding the market share of the last Windows version people generally wanted to use.  They don’t get any control over my PC.

If such a time comes that Linux-based laptops are more common, I will certainly evaluate them, and if they’re roughly on par with what I can get in terms of hardware and support from the retailer than if I buy it with Windows, I will of course preferentially take the Linux PCs, even if the distro included isn’t one I plan on using.  Wiping Linux to install Linux isn’t any harder than wiping Windows to install Linux.  I’ll stick it to Microsoft where feasible, but I am not going to cut off my nose to spite my face.

For now, I’ll have to stick with simply not using Windows rather than not using or buying it.  Microsoft has clearly shown us that they value people using Windows 10 over people paying for it (once)… that’s what the “free upgrade” period (which hasn’t actually ended, even after three years!) was all about.  The real money is in the control and monetization, quite evidently.  If the license fees were enough (as they once were back when MS and Windows were almost synonymous), they wouldn’t have had to follow the path they have chosen.

People have a natural sense of fairness and a general sense of optimism.  It’s what keeps us going in a world where the darkness is all around us.  It also leads us astray sometimes… when we continue to think that a bad actor is going to “see the light” at some point and turn back, even as the bad actions continue to get worse and worse.  That’s what I mean about not being surprised anymore when Microsoft sticks it to their users over and over and over.  It’s not going to stop– after three years of abuse by Microsoft, people have been willing to stand there and take it, and Windows 10 market share continues to increase.  If you think it’s bad now with Windows 7 roughly on par with Windows 10 in market share (ahead in one, behind in the other), just you wait until Windows 10 is far ahead.  It’s not going to be pretty.

Dell XPS 13/9310, i5-1135G7/16GB, KDE Neon 6.2
XPG Xenia 15, i7-9750H/32GB & GTX1660ti, Kubuntu 24.04
Acer Swift Go 14, i5-1335U/16GB, Kubuntu 24.04 (and Win 11)

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jagshemash, Cybertooth, Bill C.

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woody wrote:

Because 1. Microsoft has not said, unequivocally, that it will continue to honor the blocking method, especially for those on Win10 home. 2. With the 1803 upgrade, on three separate, documented occasions, Microsoft” “forgot” to honor the settings on Pro. 3. Who owns my machine, anyway?

you own the hardware but the software is only on licence, unless you coded it yourself

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John Deere and General Motors may beg to differ with your opinion on this topic:

https://www.wired.com/2015/04/dmca-ownership-john-deere/

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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MrJimPhelps wrote:

John Deere and General Motors may beg to differ with your opinion on this topic:

https://www.wired.com/2015/04/dmca-ownership-john-deere/

Did the Copyright Office also issue an exemption for Windows?

Copyright Office issues DMCA exemptions for automotive software, jailbreaking smart TV

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b wrote:

Did the Copyright Office also issue an exemption for Windows?

I don’t know; my point was that Microsoft might believe that legally they control your computer if you are running Windows 10, especially as we move into the WaaS way of doing things; although I believe Microsoft has less of a case than, say, John Deere or General Motors, because Microsoft didn’t build the machine like John Deere or General Motors did (unless it is a Surface). But Microsoft still might try to press the issue.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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arfurdent wrote:

you own the hardware but the software is only on licence, unless you coded it yourself

And?

Does that suggest that it’s okay for any software you didn’t code yourself to just do whatever it wants?  Woody wasn’t suggesting that he should be able to make copies of Windows and sell it.  He is content to let Microsoft own Windows, but he owns his machine, and Microsoft should return the favor.

Of course, MS has been getting away with murder for several years now, and they’re not even bothering to pull the “aw, shucks” thing anymore.  Now it’s more of a “Yeah, we did it.  What are YOU gonna do about it?”

 

 

 

Dell XPS 13/9310, i5-1135G7/16GB, KDE Neon 6.2
XPG Xenia 15, i7-9750H/32GB & GTX1660ti, Kubuntu 24.04
Acer Swift Go 14, i5-1335U/16GB, Kubuntu 24.04 (and Win 11)

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Cybertooth

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The time of ‘the computer’ is nearing its end anyway. I don’t know that many people – especially younger ones – that use a Windows pc or laptop on a daily basis anymore. Most are using tablets and smartphones, or even chromebooks. An operating system means not much to them. If they can do their things, it’s fine with them. Especially because of that clearly visible movement away from ‘the pc’, I do not understand why Microsoft is so extremely rude to it’s clients. The only effect it has that more and more people get fed up with it and leave. That is actually what is happening right now, even with Windowsversions itself. Windows 7’s market share is stable as a rock, slightly on the rise even. Windows 10 got stuck on a market share that is very far away from what its makers hoped for and even on a decline. All those 7-users will for sure not magically switch to 10 in 2020. Part of them will just continue using an unmaintained OS, the rest will jump off the Windows bandwagon. The signs have never been as clear as they are now.

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RamRod, Cybertooth

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It’s good that you used quotation marks around “the computer” when you said that its age is coming to an end, because (and I am sure this is what you were getting at) phones, tablets, Chromebooks, etc., are, of course, computers.  They’re just not what people think of when they say “computer.”

I have long been a “computer” fanatic, in the same sense of the word as you used it, but not so much a fan of smartphones or tablets.  I’ve found them too limiting, and only by rooting one and ripping half of its guts out would I even begin to be happy with it (which then makes banks not want to allow me to use it with their apps, on and on).  I don’t like how locked down iOS is, or how Android is Google, which spies on everything you do.

In contrast, I’ve used and generally liked Microsoft Windows for more than a quarter of a century, and I was highly interested in computers before that, since the mid-1980s.  On the one hand, the PC (and the term computer) has become so associated with Windows that I am somewhat concerned about the future of the platform with Microsoft’s apparent efforts to milk it to death short term while killing it long term.  For 88% or so of “computer” users, Windows means computer, and if Windows is scuttled, what does that mean for me, even though I am out here in Linux-land?

Then I think of the Chromebook phenomenon.

I was at a major electronics retailer a few months ago, and the LP employee at the exit was a very young woman.  I had my Dell Inspiron 11 with me (I bring my laptops in if I have them with me no matter what… not letting them get stolen if I can help it), and she was interested in it.  She liked its size and how portable that would make it, and said that she needs something for school that would allow her to run Chrome.

Well, if you’re going to do that, it so happens that there’s a series of devices that are meant to do just that!  I let her know about Chromebooks.  I am not sure if she really didn’t know about them or if she was looking for further advice before getting one… or what level of “school” she was even talking about.  She could have been college freshman age… they look so young to me now, it’s hard to even guess they’re not in high school.

Apparently these Chromebooks are catching on in a big way in education.  Kiddos are not doing their schoolwork on five inch phone touchscreens, not primarily at least… they’re using laptops.  Those, clearly, are computers, and given how dedicated these kids are to their phones, the fact that the schools use Chromebooks anyway demonstrate that more traditional computing devices are still more suited to some uses than smartphones, even to the “digital native” generation.  More than that, these things are Linux computers!  While Android runs on a Linux kernel, it’s not considered a Linux distro, but ChromeOS is.  This vaunted “year of the Linux desktop” may be closer than we think.  It may already be here in the schools.

If all one needs to do is get onto the web, a Chromebook will usually do ya.  If you don’t particularly like Google or Chrome, any other Linux distro will work just as well for getting on the web, and you can use whatever browser, whatever laptop, whatever distro you want to do it.  The laptop I am using to type this (my Acer Swift 1, now with KDE Neon) is a Chromebook-spec PC that came with Windows 10 (though I added a 1TB SSD that took it right back out of Chromebook-spec). It works very well with Neon… it’s responsive and very usable with Linux, and it can render 1080p video in hardware with only the tiniest blip of CPU activity.

Using your own Linux distro won’t give you a laptop that’s as locked-down and protected from harm and misconfiguration as a Chromebook, and it won’t have the same degree of effortless updates either, but to some of us, that’s not a bug, it’s a feature.  The point for me is that my preferred usage pattern isn’t going anywhere.  If Chromebooks are viable, then so is the Linux PC, whether it is a desktop or a laptop.  And that suits me just fine, really!  Maybe at some point I will no longer need to have Windows in a VM (which actually works even on my Swift 1.  RAM is a little tight at only 4GB, but the Swift under Linux runs the Windows 7 guest well enough to perform the tasks I can’t do natively yet).

Dell XPS 13/9310, i5-1135G7/16GB, KDE Neon 6.2
XPG Xenia 15, i7-9750H/32GB & GTX1660ti, Kubuntu 24.04
Acer Swift Go 14, i5-1335U/16GB, Kubuntu 24.04 (and Win 11)

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Elly, satrow

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its NOT ABOUT THE SYSTEM (aka OS) ppl
its ABOUT THE PPL behind the system (such as gov/coporate – which is a small bunch of ppl really)

So far at woody here – our counter-solution is to fortified our system ON OUR END
but can it work?
Can our private OS system still be safe guard if we still want to access the wider and community system (their system – aka the internet and updates)?
It feel like they are saying, go back to stone age or join the DARK SIDE, SON
No AI can be killer robots without the evil human mind behind it.
Thus it goes deeper to the REAL topic – Sovereignty! (of individual user/persons)
If M$ (or other FANGS) has no respect for the humanity of its user/person, what else CANT they do?
This is exactly the same roll-out as free google mail or tweets or intant msg or utube media stuff
first they offer it “free”
once the gather them in
then they exert control and milking and whatever else they want really
they think them themselves ‘I owned you now’
Its already been known they think to themselves they own every photo you share and every private msg you post?
How free is free… really?
Furthermore they can update their ‘law’ and agreement anytime
so are we bound to the eula when we first purchase the product or forced into their needed updated eula?

Back to fishing for better dreams

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Cybertooth

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Looks like we are in deep doo doo…
Cherry on top…
Facebook, Google, and Amazon are big winners in the new NAFTA deal
https://qz.com/1410473/facebook-fb-google-goog-and-amazon-amzn-are-big-winners-in-the-new-nafta-deal/
no more play time…
now they are really in for the explicit in-our-face control

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The Earth is round. The Sun rises in the morning. Microsoft behaves badly.

No amount of commentary will change any of the above.

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The Earth is round. The Sun rises in the morning.

No it doesn’t. The planet is spinning…

Microsoft behaves badly.

Which may have caused weird effects on some brains…

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To answer your question: How do they get away with this stuff?

It’s Microsoft’s stuff.

On permanent hiatus {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 22H2.22621.1992 x64 i5-9400 RAM16GB HDD Firefox116.0b3 MicrosoftDefender

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My question is, If we aren’t supposed to seek for updates, how do we know our systems are up to date? In that question lies the answer to MS’s devious tactic..

“A false sense of security is the only kind there is.” – Michael Meade
“Distrust and caution are the parents of security” – Benjamin Franklin
“Look for possibilities not for security.” – Debasish Mridha (new MS mantra?)

Windows - commercial by definition and now function...

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If you haven’t installed 1809 your system is not up to date.

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Well if I’m “out of date”, I might as well go all the way “out of date” and reimage my 10 machines back to 7. This is absurd. The maze does not justify the tiny piece of cheese at the end for me. At this point, running anything but 10 (which MS does not want people to do) seems like the absolute right thing to do.

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RamRod, Cybertooth, MrJimPhelps, woody, Microfix

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Maze? It’s a two-click update (check/restart) with 225 tiny pieces of cheese the end for you.

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Yet I’d still have control and could choose not to update without having to resort to unplugging the ethernet cable.

The goalposts of Win10 keep moving and I’m too old and too busy to bother playing catch up just to run Win10. I manage domains and PC’s for a living; when I come home at the end of the day I just want to use my PC’s at home, not bother fixing them or trying to block things.

225 pieces of cheese that I know about and can eat or disregard is better than an unknown amount of cheese which may or may not contain rat poison.

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It’s just MS that believes people are sitting with fingers crossed and checking if new version of W10 is available. My mother is over 70 and if she presses that button out of curiosity (“Check for Updates” doesn’t sound too bad, does it?), ending up with a bricked system, she won’t be able to do a thing about it until I come.

BTW, do you know if ECU software in your car’s engine is up to date?

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Cybertooth

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radosuaf wrote:

BTW, do you know if ECU software in your car’s engine is up to date?

No. Where’s its Check For Updates button?

(Or should I block updates just in case?)

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b wrote:

If you haven’t installed 1809 your system is not up to date.

I consider my system “up to date” as far as Windows is concerned if I am running an officially-supported version of Windows. That still includes Windows 7, in my opinion.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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Seattle27, Microfix, Elly

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@b commented:

If you haven’t installed 1809 your system is not up to date.

I believe you have confused language again. Your opinion reads as a feature update that has not yet rolled out, is the definition of up to date. My vocabulary had this called cutting edge. Up until that wasn’t graphic enough for some writers who started the trend of bleeding edge. I usually reserve that for final testing, but Microsoft has blurred that line.

Any supported OS can be up to date. And even lowly Windows 7 is still currently supported (though not developed).

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Microfix

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1809 released yesterday is the most up-to-date current version:

Windows 10 release information

So it should be no surprise to anyone that Check for updates installs it unless deferred.

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Page formatting seems to indicate this is a reply. Yet the text addresses a different point entirely. This was labelled focus shifting on another occasion.

A supported OS can be up to date without being cutting edge. XP, W7 without SP1, W8(.0), and W10-1511 are out of date. W7SP1, W8.1, and a rolling set of W10 across the consumer, Enterprise, and Education fields of the one OS ever, are all still currently supported. Or do we just admit the whole support scheme is just marketing palaver?

Check does not mean download and install under any other use of the word that I have seen. I would continue to be surprised if a request for review was interpreted as a direction to publish. A mechanic should not assume reading the dipstick as permission to rebuild the engine. A physician will generally take a few extra steps between a check up appointment and coronary bypass surgery. If I should continue in this creative endeavor, please let me know.

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Cybertooth

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anonymous wrote:

Check does not mean download and install

It always has on all editions and versions of Windows 10.

(Because we agreed to its automatic updates in the EULA.)

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You have reminded me of the more specific label, motte-and-bailey, for this type of shifting. In my view, however, even your retreat position is suspect.

I really do not believe ‘seeker’ was a term in any way attached to Windows Update until this calendar year. So I disagree with your conclusion. Please feel free to not agree with mine.

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So the seeker question was clearly about Windows 10, yet you and others dropped back to talking about XP/7/8. The switching was not mine.

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No, you’re not security wise speaking. You only miss some stupid features that are not even worth to risk a total reinstall over an existing Windows-version. Microsoft never understood the concept of modular updating. Or maybe they understood, but couldn’t make it work because of the ancient way Windows code is setup. Take only the register, a total disaster that should have gone the way of the dodo with Windows XP.

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woody wrote:

Word to the Win10 wise: Don’t click “Check for Updates”

… unless you want Windows Update to perform its normal function of providing you with an update which you haven’t deferred or paused.

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b wrote:

woody wrote:

Word to the Win10 wise: Don’t click “Check for Updates”

… unless you want Windows Update to perform its normal function of providing you with an update which you haven’t deferred or paused.

Which would be fine if those updates didn’t often break things, change settings, or take away things you were able to do. Again, how can you trust Microsoft updates if they fired their QA team that was testing them? No one wants to be an Alpha/Beta tester on production equipment, or open their systems to new vulnerabilities.

And to be blunt, MS’s telemetry has not been up to task in producing quality updates.

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But we’re talking about a feature update here, which so far hasn’t broken anything (although task manager looks like it may need a tap on the gauge).

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When I clicked “Check for Updates” on a brand-new out-of-the-box Dell Windows 10 computer, once it finished checking for updates and installing what it found, I could no longer connect to the network. The way I fixed the problem was to do a clean reinstall of Windows 10 (1709), and let it do the initial check for updates, but not click on “Check for Updates”. As long as I did not click “Check for Updates”, my Ethernet adapter continued to work.

This happened on about four brand new PCs, one right after the other, so the behavior is confirmed in my opinion.

Update on this post: I just pulled two brand new Dell Optiplex computers out of the box, plugged them in, and turned them on. The Ethernet adapter didn’t work! So I am doing a clean Windows reinstall on each of them. This has always fixed this problem in the past, so I’m sure it will now. My point? I didn’t tell these to check for updates, yet the Ethernet adapters failed. (I guess that was the problem.) So my original premise is no longer valid, because this could have been true on those PCs as well.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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Cybertooth

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Update: The problem was that the network wasn’t issuing enough IP addresses. When I ran IPCONFIG /RELEASE on a working computer, the problematic computer suddenly connected. My boss also told me that the IP range for the network was too small, so he increased it. So far, all is well.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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Why can’t windows update have the “optional updates” category like they did when they released service packs? There should be a dialogue that “a new version is available, do you want to install it?” A person should have the ability to choose whether they want to upgrade an OS on property that they own.

Red Ruffnsore

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Cybertooth, BobbyB, Microfix, zero2dash, woody

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Mr. Natural wrote:

A person should have the ability to choose whether they want to upgrade an OS on property that they own.

“Should have” is the operative phrase here. We have now moved into the era of WaaS (Windows as a Service). In other words, you no longer have the ability to pick and choose; it’s either all or nothing on updates. About the only choice you have is to slow things down (defer updates).

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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Won’t totally drop Windows, but I have certainly installed Linux desktop on some older PC’s. I am not one of those who ever thinks this year is the year of Linux desktop. But there is options out there for those who want to try something else.

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FYI I just kept “checking for updates” on my home laptop until it said “no updates available” and I’m still on 1803. 1809 was not pushed to my laptop.

Red Ruffnsore

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Woody – “Who owns my machine, anyway?”
The most telling point about W10, etc. The box is not the property of MS so there are limits to what they should do, at least if they are ethical. Otherwise the owner can vote with ‘their feet’ and eliminate the problem. 

Edit to remove HTML

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Can somebody explain to me how Microsoft gets away with this stuff

Simple: Because people let them get away with it.

If you don’t want them to get away with it, why not download an alternative today? Good alternatives include OpenMandriva and Mageia. I switched a couple of years ago, never looked back.

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You allow them to get away with it. You gave them permission. You are complicit. And compliant. When you clicked ‘Yes’ or ‘Accept’ or whatever affirmative option MS gave you on the EULA acceptance screen, you agreed to everything in the EULA. You essentially signed a contract. Now you are living up to it. Smile. Everything is legal, and according to EULA.

The question is, now that you’ve ‘signed the contract’, what are the contractual allowances to modify or cancel the contract? In order to get MS to stop their objectionable (To you) activities, what do you have to give up? Clue – it’s called MS Windows for a reason. You’ve never owned a copy of Windows – any version. You’ve always contracted for a license. The medium of exchange switched from legal tender ($) to acquiescence to MS data mining between Windows 8.1 and WinX. You now trade data for the license to use MS Windows.

Everyone really needs to understand the agreements they enter into.

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I just got “upgraded” to 1803 from 1703 while set to and using mobile data. Not a “seeker”, just an almighty ***** off Microsoft victim – Never again. F$%k.

Edit: Please refer to lounge rules regarding bad language

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after the forced update (on metered connection) from 1703 to 1803 data is mysteriously slurping (mobile) data away without me doing anything…..is it downloading 1809 now?

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Also after forced update from 1703 to 1803 my connection required me to resubmit the wifi password and had changed itself back from metered to unmetered :/

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See https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/and-yes-microsoft-has-given-itself-permission-to-install-win10-version-1809-on-any-win-10-pc-that-checks-for-updates/#post-221851

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I like the verbiage in the “Updates”:

Updates. The software periodically checks for system and app updates, and downloads and installs them for you. You may obtain updates only from Microsoft or authorized sources, and Microsoft may need to update your system to provide you with those updates. By accepting this agreement, you agree to receive these types of automatic updates without any additional notice.

I take the “authorized sources” to be “any other PC on the Internet for those that don’t know to uncheck the “allow my computer to get updates from other PCs”.

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Even if we agreed to let microsoft update our systems,  there is no excuse for them messing with out computers.

Just someone who don't want Windows to mess with its computer.

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This may be old news for the experts, but I believe that I have found a way to disable the “Check for Updates” button, at least for W10 Pro, which may prevent the curious Seeker (myself included) from getting themselves into trouble.

Within Group Policy, at Local computer policy > Computer configuration > Administrative templates > Windows components > Windows update, set “Remove access to use all Windows Update features” to Enabled.

On a re-boot and after allowing a few moments for the system to catch up with itself, you should find that Check for Updates is greyed out. My expectation is that automatic updates will continue to be applied, respecting the selected Channel, Feature Update and Quality Update delay settings.

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That’s correct. Per MS:

By enabling the Group Policy setting under Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Windows update\Remove access to use all Windows update features, administrators can disable the “Check for updates” option for users. Any background update scans, downloads and installations will continue to work as configured.

That said, the easiest cure is to simply not click Check for updates…..

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