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Hey, does anyone know whether the fact that at some point my Win10 1809 Home system was offered KB4023057 is the culprit for the appearance of the following message in the Windows Update screen (sorry that it is not English, anyway the message is nagging me about the fact that 1809 is nearing EOL and is suggesting to move to a newer version to keep receiving updates)?

Now, I did not install KB4023057 when it was offered last Tuesday, my connection is set to metered and I hid KB4023057 using wushowhide as soon as it showed up as an available update, but that message still showed up. My hunch is that WU detected the availability of the patch when it did its automatic check (indeed, the screen above shows a “Last checked on 18/2/2020” date and I never check for updates manually) and this was enough for the message to appear. As said, the same day I hid KB4023057 with wushowhide, but from previous experience I’ve seen that the WU screen is not refreshed right away and it can take several days before a message linked to the availability of a certain update disappears after hiding that update.

Does the above sound right to you? Is the availability of KB4023057 causing that message to appear? Or is it something else altogether?

Same here, still prefer to stick to 1809 for the same reasons you mention. I understand that Woody suggested to move to 1903 because of the “defer updates” feature, but I still prefer to use wushowhide to delay unwanted updates because I feel like it gives me more control on the update process.

Anyway, from past experience on 1803, so far wushowhide was always successful to avoid KB4023057 from being installed on my system. However, you still need to manually run it every once in a while to check whether that pesky updates is being pushed. It is usually issued on a monthly basis during Patch Tuesday, but occasionally pops out on other weeks as well (like this week).

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PerthMike

Thanks Alex. That’s exactly my strategy to avoid unwanted updates (including Feature updates). 🙂 The annoying part with this strategy is that every time a new build of the latest Win10 version is released we need to run wushowhide to hide the unwanted Feature update. Still better than being forced to updatewhe I don’t want to. At least, wushowhide gives me a measure of control on the updates.

This patch is a bit too intrusive for my taste and I always avoid it like a plague. Thinking about how it works, I can’t help thinking that it is the closest we get to an officially sanctioned malware… 🙂
Sadly, skipping this patch is not enough to prevent a forced Feature update.

Well, the good news is that I don’t use Adobe Creative Cloud nor BitDefender Total Security and I haven’t installed .NET Framework 4.8 at all on my 1809 machine (so none of the 4.8 patches are installed here). The bad news is that if this starts happening on my computer then we will have to figure out an entirely different culprit… 😉

Mistakenly posted as ‘anonymous’ earlier on, but it seems that that post disappeared along the way, so I’m giving it a second try… 🙂

Windows 10 1809 Home here. Just reporting that in addition to the 2020-02 CU (KB4532691) I’m also offered the following:
– KB4524244 (the “UEFI” patch);
– KB4537759 – 2020-02 Security update for Adobe Flash Player Windows 10 1809;
– KB4538122 – 2020-02 Cumulative Update for .NET Framework 3.5, 4.7.2 and 4.8 for Windows 10 Version 1809;
– KB890830 – Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool February 2020.

Not installing any of the above atm.

Also, as of today I haven’t been “offered” a forced Feature update from 1809 to 1909 or 1903, but I’m offered the optional 1909 Feature update (no optional 1903 Feature update so far, but last month it showed up several days after Patch Tuesday).

That’s a very good point you have raised. Indeed, Windows Insiders isn’t really thinking the same way as sainted Aunt Martha, nor do they represent (as a whole) the real “average user” in all likelihood.

Your analogy between OSes and cars/TVs seems pretty solid too. Maybe this means that we are just going to see an increase in the list of bloatware that comes packaged into Windows or improvements to ‘features’ that the real average user hardly cares for, just for the sake of ‘spicing up’ the OS in an attempt to make it more attractive and distinguishable from its competitors in the same product space.

That list speaks volumes about what the average Windows 10 users perceive as important features… [/insert sarcastic face here]. Also, it confirms that sadly the average Windows 10 user has a level of experience using a computer akin to Aunt Martha if that’s the features he/she cares about the most, which in turn explains to my naive self why Microsoft has been hiding for years important configuration settings in out of the place locations, locking them behind multiple confirmation screens or making them available only through register edits: after all, the sysadmin life would be easier if that kind of average users don’t poke around their computer where they shouldn’t. 🙂

Anyway, I think that the only Windows 10 improvement I’ve seen so far (and I’ve been using this OS since its first incarnation), is the possibility to pause updates introduced in 1903 and I don’t think there’s anything else that’s really worth noting.

Now, the next improvement for me will be when Windows 10 stops forced updates of a version deemed to be near EOL to the latest version some 4-5 months before actually hitting EOL. (But of course, “near” is a relative term, so while my interpretation is that <1 month is near EOL, Microsoft’s interpretation can be 4-5 months earlier means nearing EOL. 😀

Thanks PK! I never install the optional updates myself. I might be mistaken, but the KB4535669 .NET update does not show up as optional on my system: apparently it has entirely replaced KB4535101.

Hey TJ, I installed KB4534273 on my 1809 Home machine a few days ago and didn’t run into any issue either during installation or after.

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TJ

Windows 10 1809 Home here. Already installed the January 2020 CU (KB4534273) and MSRT update (KB890830) a few days ago, after testing “vulnerable” in the SANS test. These two patches installed without problems and the system is running fine as far as I can tell.

At this time, I have only a couple of Office 2013 patches to install and the January 2020 Cumulative Update for .NET Framework 3.5, 4.7.2 and 4.8. Is there any pressing reason to install these or can I skip these for the time being? In particular, I’m wondering whether there is any substantial risk if I wait to install the .NET update: I was originally offered KB4535101 (released on January 14, 2020), but this patch has been superseded by KB4535669 (released on January 23, 2020) and I’d like to wait a bit more to install a patch released just two days ago and see if any bug report surfaces. Alternatively, would you advise manually installing KB4535101 from the MS Update Catalog?

Hey Woody,

Didn’t get stampeded to install the patch, but I note that in your post on January 17 you advised that “Unless your system, specifically, triggers a “You Are Vulnerable” warning in the SANS test, I recommend that you wait to patch” and after getting the You Are Vulnerable warning on my system (Windows 10 1809 patched up to December 2019, running Firefox 72.0.1) I sucked it up and installed the January 2020 cumulative patch and the Windows MSRT January update for good measure.

So far so good and I did not have any issue with these two updates (didn’t install the January .NET updates and Office patches though).

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jburk07, woody

Windows 10 Home 1809 with December 2019 updates installed. I tested Firefox 72.0.1 (64 bit) and got the “You Are Vulnerable” message on the SANS test page.

I’m kinda perplexed: aren’t all Windows 10 versions without the January updates supposed vulnerable? Or does it also depend on the browser? Firefox is stated to be “not vulnerable”, but then why did I get the “You Are Vulnerable message” on the test page?

Given woody’s advice to install the January patches if getting the “You Are Vulnerable” message, I gritted my teeth and let those patches through. Accessing the SANS test page again after completing installation of the patches now gives me a “You Are Not Vulnerable” message.

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PKCano

Win10 1809 here, reporting that after this week’s Patch Tuesday I have not been pushed onto 1909. The Feature Update to 1909 still shows up as an optional update when checking using Powershell while wushowhide only shows availability of the December CU for 1809.

When I was still on 1803 and MS announced they would start pushing 1803 users onto 1903, one month passed between the announcement and the actual pushing. Just a guess here, but maybe we are going to see in January next year the push to 1909.

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abbodi86

Interesting… That mirrors my experience on 1803 Home back in July-September before I moved to 1809: no CUs offered, only 1903 and the other updates (.NET, etc) were showing up. I know that I’ll be annoyed if this happens also with 1809, but I’m curious to see whether this happens again just to see if it’s standard practice for MS to have only the feature update show up as a regular update on devices running a Win 10 version deemed close to EOL.

Ironically, for users hiding the feature update on that kind of devices it’s this practice that will actually prevent them from receiving the monthly updates rather than the obsolescence of the installed version.

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abbodi86