January to April 2018 updates

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I am new here so please forgive my mistakes —

I have two computers at home – my own and my wife’s Dell Inspiron 15R 5520 laptop. I addition to these I look after six computers where I do two days a week voluntaty work. All computers have i5 processors (Haswell, Ivy bridge, or Sandy Bridge processors).

All updates done up to end of December 2017.

Windows Updates turned off —
Image of computers done with Macrium Reflect as of end of December.
Allow Reg key has also been installed by Avast antivirus on all machines.
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The following are my notes for each month as I have been following the updates debacle.

Note — the six machines I maintain as a volunteer all have fixed IP addresses set in each machine so the whole network is effected by the March Updates.

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JANUARY UPDATES
KB4056894 — For Meltdown and Spectre vunerabilities
Causes slowing of computer
(my wife’s laptop took 8 times longer to start with this update)
Some computers will not do a restart but have to be forced restarted — Pre haswell cpu’s suspected
Does not solve Spectre problem

Update Hidden
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FEBRUARY UPDATES

KB4074598
For Meltdown and Spectre vunerabilities
Some computers will not do a restart but have to be forced restart — Pre haswell cpu’s suspected with Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge CPU computers at QMBC
Does not solve Spectre problem

Update Hidden
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MARCH UPDATES

KB4088875 — Breaks Fixed IP addresses — Suddenly withdrawn

KB4088881 offered on 25th March
Info from MS says it breaks Fixed IP addresses on network

KB 4099950 — offered on 31st March as an optional update — Appears to be a fix for broken network IP addresses caused in KB4088875

Neither of these have been installed
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APRIL UPDATES

KB 4099950 offered on 5th April as an Important update this time
Appears to be a fix for the breaking of Fixed IP network addresses but later than the March KB 4099950

KB 4093118 – April Quality rollup – offered as an important update on 12th April

Many fixes including breaking of network fixed IP addresses (so maybe we do not have to install KB 4099950 but it is still offered )

KB 4093118 – Reportedly keeps presenting itself for installation in an endless loop.

KB 4056894 — January update and KB 4074598 — February update
Have disappeared from “Hidden updates” where I put them

Neither of these have been installed

18th April
KB 4099950, (the abandoned patch for fixing the NIC/static IP bug in Win7) was removed and not offered for update again

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A question – Can the Allow Reg Key be removed from the registry? This would stop the Meltdown / Spectre updates from being installed — I think. As there are no “In the wild” instances of these two vulnerabilities and the motherboard manufacturers are not likely to update the old motherboards, I wonder if this a reasonable way to go.

Any advice / comments as to what to do in the current circumstances would be appreciated.

mbhelwig

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Hi, My patching history to date this year is basically the same as yours and for broadly similar reasons. In the light of Woody’s latest post, “Total Meltdown (not Meltdown!) exploit now available”, I suggest we both thank our lucky stars and stay as we are. In consequence of our (others would say excessive) caution, we are amongst the lucky ones. All the Windows updates I’ve installed so far this year have been one or two security-only IE patches and the odd security MO 2010 patch, although my other programs are patched up-to-date. As I understand it, the QualityCompat reg key will not be needed to install patches via WU as from April, so whether it’s present in the registry or not is moot point. MSE installed mine for me and, as I prefer not to mess with the registry, I’m leaving well alone. The long list of updates that contain the “Total Meltdown” vulnerability will not be installed on my PC because I’ve hidden them. I don’t know whether you might wish to do the same?

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Elly

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“I suggest we both thank our lucky stars and stay as we are. In consequence of our (others would say excessive) caution, we are amongst the lucky ones.”

Thank you for your reply. Yes I think you are right. It is sad to see an organization like MS failing so badly. For years I had win 7 set on auto update with no problems. With the introduction of the monthly rollup for win 7, I had the windows updates set on “notify me” as It soon became apparent that the updates were not reliable — the update that broke the epson dot matrix printer drivers last October was a real wakeup call for me as we use three of these printers where I do voluntary work. Fortunately I avoided the disaster by finding  the “Ask Woody” site. Now I am very suspicious of all updates coming out of MS and with good reason — this year has been a real catastrophe for MS updates. Just what are they doing ?????

This morning I noticed that the “2018-04 Security Monthly Quality Rollup for Windows 7 for x64-based Systems (KB4093118)” Was dated 23rd April 2018 whereas yesterday it was dated 12th April 2018. Looks like there has been an update perhaps? — who knows !!!

As I see it I have two options —

1   Turn off updates completely and permanently and leave my computers updated to December 2017

2  Wait until all the problems have been fixed — how long is a piece of string —

Moving to windows 10 is not an option as their updates are full of problems too — and cannot be turned off — on that subject my brother operates a laptop driving a projector for his local church, putting up hymns etc on a screen for the congregation to read. They have to disconnect the laptop from the internet before using it to stop win 10 from updating in the middle of the service — what a pain.

I am not sure what I will do at this point.

mbhelwig

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HiFlyer

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mbhelwig wrote:

They have to disconnect the laptop from the internet before using it to stop win 10 from updating in the middle of the service — what a pain.

As a churchgoer myself, I find this hilarious. “M/S disrupts wedding/funeral/christening, ruining the solemnity of the occasion, to the great distress of family, clergy and worshippers.” – I don’t think it’s wise for us to do anything at this point but wait and see. So far this year, waiting and seeing has saved my PC from sabotage. Doubtless the way forward will become evident as M/S makes its future moves. If they can’t get their act together, I personally am going to have to find an alternative OS I can get along with.

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I have decided to wait and see what happens.

My son made the transition to Linux mint successfully in 2017.

As for me I am going to look at Linux and Apple OS’s as a possible alternative but I will have to still work with windows as the six machines where I do some voluntary work will probably have to stay in the windows arena — we have custom written software which runs only on windows. As I am responsible for updating them I am wanting to be very careful what I do. At the moment its “no updates” until all is resolved.

The church laptop I referred to had to be replaced due to a catastrophic motherboard failure, and that’s how they came to have windows 10.

It seem strange to me that MS is holding on to the mandatory monthly updates when a little concession on this point would help a lot of people migrate to win 10.

Anyway May is coming up, I wonder what dainties MS will have for us this month.

 

mbhelwig

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HiFlyer

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Hey everyone,

The last Monthly Quality Rollup i’ve downloaded is 2017-12 (KB4054518). I havent downloaded any since then for the same reasons outlined in the initial post. Every month I find myself back on Askwoody and in the Lounge to see if its worth updating to a newer patch. Every single time the answer has been no – the sniff test says nay nay.

Even with Woody and Patch Lady’s help (both of which I am very appreciative), I am just unwilling to take the risk and update. There are too many issues in the past with these patches and if even they’re reported to be fixed – I’m not going to take any chances. I guess we’ll see in due time if we’re right or wrong.

See you on the other side.

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