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Author Topic: Tip: After installing Windows Updates, kill the popup...  (Read 6651 times)

mr_chris

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Tip: After installing Windows Updates, kill the popup...
« on: July 01, 2006, 01:39:12 PM »

After installing Windows Updates, if I'm in the middle of doing something, I often get incredibly frustrated by the "Restart Now / Restart Later" box that pops up every 5 minutes.

What if I don't want to restart JUST NOW... but I know I need to do so later. There's no option to turn it off.

Well, here's how to do it anyway ;) Note, you need to have Administrator access to be able to do this.

From Control Panel, open Administrative Tools (if you are in Category Mode, you need to choose Performance and Maintenance first).
Then open Services.
Right-click the "Automatic Updates" service, and choose Stop.
Note that because the Automatic Updates service is still set to automatically start with your PC, doing this will not change or harm your system configuration whatsoever.

There is a quicker way to do this:
From the Start menu, choose Run
Type net stop wuauserv and press Enter or click OK.
That's it :)

Hope you guys find this useful!


Disclaimer: Only do this if you're prepared to accept any possible side effects of not restarting your computer immediately after applying a Windows Update. Before restarting your PC, Windows may be in a state whereby it has been half updated, and may be slightly less stable as a result. It should return to normal functionality upon reboot. It is always recommended to restart the PC before undertaking any "mission critical" tasks.
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Chris

oldfogy

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Re: Tip: After installing Windows Updates, kill the popup...
« Reply #1 on: July 20, 2006, 01:05:47 PM »

Quote from: "mr_chris"
After installing Windows Updates, if I'm in the middle of doing something, I often get incredibly frustrated by the "Restart Now / Restart Later" box that pops up every 5 minutes.

What if I don't want to restart JUST NOW... but I know I need to do so later. There's no option to turn it off.
Surely this is down to the fact of having Automatic updates activated (as recommended).

How about if you try the:
"Notify me but don't automatically download or install" option?
At least this way you would still be notified of updates, which you can then select to install and re-boot at a later time,
such as when going to make the tea/coffee.

Or even:
"Download updates for me, but let me choose when to install them"
Again you have the option to choose when to install and re-boot.

With both of the options above you are only notified on one occasion, with a reminder sitting on the task bar in the form of a Yellow shield.
Or on system shut-down.

The point is, you are in control of your PC and not Microsoft demanding what you should do, when halfway into another project.
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sallyandjames

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Re: Tip: After installing Windows Updates, kill the popup...
« Reply #2 on: March 13, 2007, 11:36:28 AM »

Apologies for dragging up an old topic, but the disclaimer on the OP compelled me to add this note!

There are two reasons windows wants to re-start, but both hinge on the same reason;

DLLs!

A restart of your machine forces Windows to reload all of the DLL's required to run, once explorer is running, the DLLs are locked.

Simply kill explorer.exe (via task manager, right-click your taskbar then go to processes and select explorer.exe, then hit 'End Process' windoze will warn you that it won't warn explorer its about to die! Acknowledge OK)

Hey presto, explorer (which means taskbar, start menu, systray etc) dissappears, and then re-launches itself.

You now have the new DLLs loaded, and your update is complete.

Second reason, is that part of the installation requires these new DLLs to be loaded in order to start off a second stage of installation (anybody remember the upgrade from IE5.5 to 6?) In this case, its generally easier to actually restart windows - if its critical that your machine isn't restarted, there are ways round it, but it involves removing some entries in the runonce section of the registry - ask if you want further details!

Of course, its only helpful knowing this, if you have managed to persuade windows to stop asking you to re-start, but its handy after installations of new programs as well as critical updates etc.

The only problem is that some sloppy coders give you no option but to restart after install... GRRR

Its *MY* machine, *NOT* Billy G's. ;)

How else can a windows server administrator maintain patched environments with full uptime?
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tickmike

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Re: Tip: After installing Windows Updates, kill the popup...
« Reply #3 on: March 27, 2007, 11:00:25 PM »

Hello, Sallyandjames and welcome to the forum.
 When I read this "Simply kill explorer.exe"    :no:  I had my doubts about this method , so on a 'Test' machine ( XP Pro.) I tried it and all I got was a nice view of my desktop with no icons , taskbar or system tray.
You said .."and then re-launches itself."   It does not.( after 10 mins )

The only way I could log out was to use 'Task manager'
All was back again when I logged back in.!.

Michael.

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roseway

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Re: Tip: After installing Windows Updates, kill the popup...
« Reply #4 on: March 28, 2007, 07:45:19 AM »

Do the popups use the Windows messenger service? If so, then I guess that they can easily be stopped by disabling the messenger service, which as I understand it is of little if any practical use to ordinary mortals.

Eric
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  Eric

havelock

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Re: Tip: After installing Windows Updates, kill the popup...
« Reply #5 on: March 28, 2007, 11:53:30 AM »

Think they're wuauserv hooking into explorer.exe tbh. I never run the messenger service but still get the restart popups


Havelock
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mr_chris

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Re: Tip: After installing Windows Updates, kill the popup...
« Reply #6 on: March 28, 2007, 10:12:18 PM »

Yep, it's wuauserv running as an interactive service, nothing to do with the messenger service.
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Chris
 

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