Microsoft confirms that Win10 1703 users are being upgraded without warning to 1709

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Sometime in the past few hours, Microsoft fessed up to the forced upgrade I talked about last week. The problem that I described on Wednesday continue
[See the full post at: Microsoft confirms that Win10 1703 users are being upgraded without warning to 1709]

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Elly

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At least we get Paint 3D and… stuff, right?

Fractal Design Pop Air * Thermaltake Toughpower GF3 750W * ASUS TUF GAMING B560M-PLUS * Intel Core i9-11900K * 4 x 8 GB G.Skill Aegis DDR4 3600 MHz CL16 * ASRock RX 6800 XT Phantom Gaming 16GB OC * XPG GAMMIX S70 BLADE 1TB * SanDisk Ultra 3D 1TB * Samsung EVO 840 250GB * DVD RW Lite-ON iHAS 124 * Windows 10 Pro 22H2 64-bit Insider * Windows 11 Pro Beta Insider

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This would seem to be a GWX deja vu.

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woody, fk5353, Elly, Microfix, GoneToPlaid, RamRod, BobbyB, Sessh, walker, lurks about

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I think the PHBs in charge have not figured out you should stop while shooting yourself in the foot. It seems every few months they move higher up the body.

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DeWayne12, Elly, Bill C., MrJimPhelps

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Well given all the past stuff Microsoft has done to push Windows 10. This is not a shock.  I am under the impression Microsoft all along wants to eventually get all Windows PC’s on the same release or at least as many as can run it.

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Which release? 1511, 1703, 1709, 1803, 1906? How many versions are there? Don’t fool yourself into thinking there’s only one WinX. I posit there are more versions of WinX floating around than XP, Vista, and 7 combined.

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Elly, lurks about

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What a nice surprise it was, when on patch tuesday, blissfully unaware of this, I clicked my laptop to check updates and went off to get dinner. Coming back and expecting a message to reboot for finishing the patches installation, instead I’m seeing 1709 being installed, disregarding my CBB setting.

Many curse words were uttered.

Microsoft seems to be still dedicated to test, how low they can drop their QA and/or how far they can go p****** off their customers.

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I just wanted to update flash today so turned off CBB and both deferrals, checked with wushowhide and hid the two 1703 KBs.

Next thing I knew, when I ran windows update to install Flash I also got the 1709 download.

Before it started, quickly ran wushowhide and ‘hid’ it, then rebooted, but it was still there.

I was successful, however, in resetting CBB and set both deferral periods to max, with a further reboot, I stopped it.

It is truly worrying!

Dell Inspiron 16 Plus 7640 Core Ultra 7 155H 32GB Win 11 Pro 23H2 (22631.5335)
Dell Inspiron 15 7580 i7 16GB Win 11 pro 24H2 (26100.4061),
Microsoft 365 Version 2504 (18730.20122)
Location: UK

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walker

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Glad I stayed on 1607 for the time being!

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Glad I stayed on Windows 7 for the time being!

It takes me many months to get a new install setup how I want and all my programs and games working. I don’t want to go through that every 6 months with Windows 10. I would never have a working computer, I would always be “almost done setting it up how I like.” I’d rather configure my system once, then run it for 3+ years until I get the itch for a new CPU or GPU.

I bought a AMD Ryzen at release, and I just now have it running how I want. But the good news is since I am on Windows 7, now that it is configured, I will be enjoying it until 2020, while the rest of the world will have to deal with 5 more major Windows 10 versions. No thank you.

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johnf, fk5353, Elly, Bill C., Rock, Microfix, The Surfing Pensioner, Noel Carboni, GoneToPlaid, Cybertooth, ryegrass, Sessh

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+1

My way of thinking as well.

In late 2012 I got a new top-end workstation with Win 7 (even though Win 8 was already out). In late 2013 I put Win 8.1 on it and it has delivered (and continues to deliver) delightful performance stably and reliably. I have been only just starting to think about getting a new tech workstation, since compute performance has doubled, and I will likely act on these urges within the next year.

That’s 4+ years of “works every day, all day, without my being bogged down trying to make the host operating system work right”.

To be fair, I do spend some time doing that kind of thing – when *I* want to, with Win 10 in virtual machines – just to keep abreast of the latest developments. But at no time am I faced with the panic of “how the heck am I going to get my work done today?”

Stability’s worth a lot. A heckuva lot.

-Noel

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johnf, HiFlyer, fk5353, Elly, MrJimPhelps, Rock

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+2.

With all the GWX debacle, enhanced snooping and the plans around forced upgrades, I took the plunge late last year and switched to Linux Mint on my workstation (kept the laptop on Windows 7 because someone else is managing the patches for me). Linux isn’t necessarily for the faint hearted (my older DVB-TV device was a devil to get working, and I do miss the broader device support) but Microsoft did finally persuade me to shift my home system to a different OS. I left it dual boot – haven’t booted to Windows in well over six months.

Other than that initial effort setting up the OS (Windows or Linux), my stable (Windows and Linux) systems give me no trouble day to day. And now I get to do incremental learning on running Linux that I never used to get.

Reminding the customer base about the OS update issues every six months and teaching the tech-savvy part of the base about a competing OS just doesn’t feel like a winning strategy.

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johnf, HiFlyer, Elly

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+3.

So glad I moved to Linux Mint, with Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 in VM sessions.

Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 stay OFF and OUT OF SIGHT unless I have a reason to turn them on. Such as, when it’s time to run Windows updates, or when I need to scan something (still haven’t got my scanner working in Linux).

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

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johnf, HiFlyer, Elly

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So VueScan isn’t working on your setup? I had so much trouble with my wireless scanner not working with XSANE that I took someone’s advice from here, and installed VueScan. The free version has watermarks, but otherwise it works on my system where XSANE, Simple Scan and the other Ubuntu Scan utility don’t work. Printing with the same wireless all in one (an Epson XP-410 series) works flawlessly without special utilities or drivers. I’m guessing the bug is somewhere in SANEd, but beyond that, I haven’t a clue. (This is with Ubuntu 16.04 LTS.) The very recent Intel NUC BIOS upgrade hasn’t changed a thing about this issue.

(I also posted here on having a workaround for the VueScan watermarks.)

-- rc primak

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HiFlyer, Elly

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A workaround? Really?

Other than paying the measly $30 requested for a full version?

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Great! Forum had me logged out…

But the above off-topic rant belongs to me!

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It’s more than $30.00. It’s $99.00 for the full license. I won’t pay that much to fix a problem in a free OS. Especially when it’s Ubuntu’s own fault for wrecking XSANE when they ported it over to Systemd. Ubuntu’s developers should have fixed this already, not waiting as they seem to be doing for the next LTS release, Ubuntu 18.04.

When the free way to do something doesn’t work and there’s a free workaround to get something else working, why pay for the paid upgrade? That’s just encouraging highway robbery. We who use Linux generally frown upon highway robbery.

-- rc primak

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VueScan works just fine. The problem is, if I want to get rid of the watermarks, I have to pay for the program.

So what I did instead is that I installed VMWare, and put Windows 8.1 in a VM. I can scan from Windows 8.1 in the VM, although not yet directly from Linux.

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

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HiFlyer

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So taking a screenshot of the Preview is not a good solution for you? It’s OK to say it isn’t — some people want to stay clear of even the slightest whiff of impropriety.

I had been using Windows 10 in a dual-boot. But that is a pain to do when switching requires a restart. Especially with the sound driver never shutting down properly when I do a restart. (Happens with both Windows and Linux. It’s probably an issue with the Intel Core-i5 Skylake firmware, which was recently updated, but not fixed for this microcode flaw.)

-- rc primak

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Glad I stayed on Debian Stable for the time being!
I can update whatever I want, and block whatever I want.

If you can’t control your system, then it’s NOT your system.

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Debian started this Systemd nonsense, so don’t be so smug.

-- rc primak

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Luckily I hid 1709 update during the auto install when it tried to force itself down my computer’s throat, but thankfully after restart/reboot after I hid it, it was gone and my computer was safe.

I double check winhide to ensure the update is gone and hidden well. I am checking again tonight before bed just to be safe.

At least I don’t have to install updates until level 3 in January after December’s updates are safe to install. Just gotta be careful when I click security and maintenance otherwise the win update will switch to manual (trigger start).

I have win update disabled (service stopped) and I checked yesterday night or so and computer is safe from auto scan for updates. It said 11-16-17 which was last scanned. I will double check again to be sure it said last scan 11-16-17 AND ENSURE 1709 update is kept hidden in winhide.

Also Happy thanksgiving everyone-it’s tomorrow so I say it early.

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Meanwhile back at the Windows 7 and 8.1 ranch…

All quiet, sunny skies with summer seasonal temeratures -;)  Not a cloud in the sky for the foreseeable future.

Am I ever glad I didn’t get on the Win10 bandwagon – I read just about every post here on the forums and am totally appaled at what users have to go through.  Microsoft, are U listening?

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fk5353, HiFlyer, Sessh, Noel Carboni, Elly, Karlston, Rock, lurks about, ryegrass

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Same here, I settled on the newest, most mature, most stable Windows OS,  Windows 8.1.

After the infamous unconscionable GWX campaign I decided I trusted Microsoft about as far as I could throw Steve Ballmer’s chair… with him sitting in it… and Bill Gates on his lap… holding his entire fortune in gold bullion… and wearing really, really, heavy glasses…

Hanlon's Razor: Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.

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HiFlyer, Sessh, Noel Carboni, Elly

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SB has an interesting update, which corresponds to all the data points I’ve seen:

I think the trigger is GUI versus local group policy/registry.

One of the posters here:  https://www.tenforums.com/windows-updates-activation/98002-fall-creators-update-installing-despite-being-business-branch.html  hinted that he did it via the gui and it didn’t hold.  When he did it via local group policy it did.

“Just made an account here just to say I have encountered the same issue. Updates were set to CBB in the Settings app but not in gpedit.

I managed to cancel the installation by manually rebooting (while it was ‘preparing to install update’) and then stopping the Windows Update service. Next I enabled the relevant policy in gpedit, and for now the 1709 update seems to have disappeared from the pending updates…”

It’s an odd bird, eh?

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Elly

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Sorry for spamming but this has already helped many times.

I wrote this script specifically to fully and eternally enable/disable Windows Update without worries because after updating Windows -even some minor updates- it’s the wild wild west again and again.

It has always worked since then (one year right now). But if Windows update reenables itself again after using it, please contact me.

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lurks about wrote:

I think the PHBs in charge have not figured out you should stop while shooting yourself in the foot. It seems every few months they move higher up the body.

Naw. They continue to shoot themselves in the foot while infusing blood into the top of their body. It is the new definition of the circulatory system. Everything you learning in high school about the circulatory system and how it functions was fake news.

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HiFlyer, Karlston

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So far, knock on wood, having the servicing branch and deferrals set via registry has also kept a few 1703 builds I have from upgrading to 1709 as well. (I wanted to test registry vs local group policy and see if there was a difference in MS respecting the settings.)

Given that the feature updates are akin to service packs, I do wish it was a 1x yearly thing, especially since no sane person (in the past) would install SP’s on day 1 either. MS really needs to realize that a large enough subset of users prefer stability over new features, and they should back off. Even on my netbook running 1703 Home, I’m tired of jumping through hoops trying to stay on 1703. Why does it have to be this hard? It shouldn’t be, that’s for sure.

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HiFlyer, Microfix, Noel Carboni, lurks about

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I would argue most users of any OS prefer stability over new features if they have to choose. To them, computers are tools expected to work with tolerable reliability every day. And for the majority of users, their activities do not require any new OS features to email, watch cat videos, log on to Facebook, etc.

Patches to fix bugs and security issues, no problem.

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HiFlyer, Elly, MrJimPhelps, Karlston, Rock, Noel Carboni

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Interesting how once we’ve been hammered with a 6-8 month upgrade cadence, people begin to pine for once yearly.

That’s STILL too often, for the same reasons (and THEN some) it was too often before.

“And THEN some” == Windows is now more complex than ever (HOW many processes does it run now to support an empty desktop?). People are no more capable of managing complexity than they were in the 1990s.

Microsoft had it right before any of this WaaS BS… A major release every THREE years, with a service pack at around 18 months to bring us all up to the build they had been using and which passed extensive system testing. This is so obvious plankton could understand it.

-Noel

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johnf, HiFlyer, Elly, Rock, Microfix

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Noel – For most users I think the cadence of an LTS version every 2 – 4 years with multi year support (minimum 5 years) works. Users have a stable system for several years and only have to deal with an upgrade every few years. Service packs or the equivalent can be pushed out as needed during the support period. But these should be mostly patch and security update rollups with minimal new features added. If new features are added they probably should be to extend support to newer hardware (USB 3 support when USB 2 was the best at original release).

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Elly, Noel Carboni

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Noel said, … Microsoft had it right before any of this WaaS BS… A major release every THREE years, with a service pack at around 18 months to bring us all up to the build they had been using and which passed extensive system testing. This is so obvious, plankton could understand it.

.
But the previous 3-year upgrade cadence was not filling M$’s coffers fast enough to satisfy the shareholders. Some Enterprises even used Win XP Ent/POS-Embedded for more than 10 years. This is so obvious, the CEO of M$ could understand it when he was just an “amoeba”.

IOW, super-greed led to the Win 10 debacle.

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HiFlyer, Elly

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The problem is this: Shareholders seem to want to get rich quick vs. wait for hard work to pay off.

-Noel

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Elly

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“Get rich quick”, such as the WaaS model that Microsoft has switched to, pays off in the short term. But it hurts your company in the long term, because it damages your reputation – people come to the conclusion that they can’t trust you or your products.

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

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HiFlyer, Noel Carboni, Elly

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I originally developed a medical laboratory application around 1990 (building on my colleagues’  previous, mainframe, application dating from the 1970s).  I maintained that application on MSDOS 5 and later MSDOS 6 until January 2010 when it was retired (in a few cases, still running on the original 1990 hardware).  Networked using Netware / IPX protocol.  Comms to the outside world by ftp to/from one specific machine (no ftp server).

Throughout those 20 years, my maintenance effort was to keep up with changes in the user requirement (continuous — perfectly fair), but never to deal with OS changes.  (Ok, the change from Btrieve 5 to Btrieve 6 was not entirely painless but was achieved without impact on the laboratory users.)

The availability requirement was, informally “24h*7 for read, 23h45*7 for update”, every day of every year (the laboratory provided a 24-hour service).  I claim that we achieved nearly that, over the system lifetime.

But on Win10?  Not a hope (and I am glad that I am fully retired from that field).

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Elly

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It seems MS is evolving their W10 into a ‘feature not a bug ‘computer science opposed to a stable, reliable OS for end-users and admins alike.

Surely a way around this is to undo what was forcefully/ inadvertantly done by MS via an online questionaire with certain criteria points that initiates an online rollback to a previous version preserving settings and applications. Once this is done, MS have a note of who, why and where have rolled back (especially the CBB) and have a better understanding of what clients want from the OS.

dream on eh..

Windows - commercial by definition and now function...

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Elly

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Does anybody know if November 22, 2017—KB4055254 (OS Build 15063.729) fixes this issue? Issue “Windows Pro devices on the Current Branch for Business (CBB) will upgrade unexpectedly” is not listed for this update.

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The answer is no. The article was updated recently.

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(source; https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-update/how-to-disable-automatic-updates-on-windows-10/e44e5986-8700-40e6-a4b1-2eca8cffda4e)

Please tell me how to effectively disable Automatic Updates on Windows 10 Home (1607).

Microsoft is ruining my life! After re-installing Windows 10 Home (1607) on Thursday for the 32nd time this year, I woke up this morning to find out that my (custom built) work PC has been yet again updated without my consent.

I’ve had to reinstall Windows 10 (1607) roughly 32 times this year because the Creator’s update (1709) keeps breaking my work PC.

I briefly tried switching to Windows 7 but had to switch back to Windows 10 (1607) due to software incompatibility issues.

I’ve tried every solution I can find (registry hacks), and I’ve spent at least 4 hours on the phone to the Microsoft Up and Running team in India, despite granting them remote access to my PC, nothing they’ve done has worked — It’s been a complete waste of my time.

This issue has been beyond frustrating, moreover, it has cost me thousands of pounds because It takes me roughly 5 days to painstakingly re-install and reconfigure the myriad of programs I use (code editors, design software, music software, 3D software and plugins) while also dealing with other responsibilities in my life. There’s nothing more embarrassing than telling a client you can’t meet a deadline because your computer isn’t working.

Worst of all, I feel trapped because I can’t afford the cost of building a new PC (in the hopes that it might be able to handle the creator’s update) or switching to a top-tier Mac.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

— John

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Start with Woody’s ComputerWorld article about how to block updates. It will give you some instructions about stopping updates.

And another more recent article on Turning off Automatic Updates.

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More methods: Methods for stopping Windows 10 updates that work on all editions and builds.

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Although I run Win 7, I just noticed a servicing stack update for Win 10 1703 that is dated Nov 14th.

Was this in the original bunch of Patch Tuesday releases, or is it “late to the party”? If it’s late to the party, could it be a fix for the unwanted upgrades to 1709? If it wasn’t late to the party, could it be the cause of the unwanted upgrades?

The link I found is here: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/4049011/servicing-stack-update-for-windows-10-version-1703-november-14-2017

 

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That update is listed at https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/894199/software-update-services-and-windows-server-update-services-changes-in as being released on November 14.

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The servicing stack was a normal part of the updates released 11/14

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MrBrian wrote:

That update is listed at https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/894199/software-update-services-and-windows-server-update-services-changes-in as being released on November 14.

PKCano wrote:

The servicing stack was a normal part of the updates released 11/14

Is it possible then, since it’s a servicing stack update, that it d/l’ed and installed on a system in the background irrespective of any GP, registry, or other settings to the contrary? That’s the only way I could think of that it would be the cause of the forced upgrades, since it was released with the other updates on the 14th.

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The servicing stack is not a system upgrade.

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Microsoft documents it as a flaw in builds 15063.726 and 15063.728.

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PKCano wrote:

The servicing stack is not a system upgrade.

Ok, I get that, so it isn’t possible to have it d/l and install in the background irrespective of system settings. Thanks for the clarification!

MrBrian wrote:

Microsoft documents it as a flaw in builds 15063.726 and 15063.728.

With the above being said, is it possible that installing the servicing stack update by itself would hopefully prevent the unwanted behavior shown by the forcing of upgrades? After all, isn’t the servicing stack responsible for such behavior, i.e. the forced upgrading of the OS?

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The upgrade had nothing to do with the servicing stack and visa versa.

It was shades of GWX all over again. You know “Oops,, it was an accident” or “The red X means OK, go ahead and install.” The changed the verbage from CBB to SAC, but not in the software, so they didn’t acknowledge the CBB setting.
So what was their excuse this time? As @MrBrian said “Microsoft documents it as a flaw in” the builds. (Yeah, sure)

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MrJimPhelps wrote:

(still haven’t got my scanner working in Linux).

It was one of the more difficult hardware configurations I have done in Linux,  but I got my Canon all-in-one scanner working in Mint.  I ended up downloading SANE (I think it was in the release or at least in the repo, but it wasn’t new enough or something) and building it from source, and it works nicely now.

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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Ah, build from source! That would of course fix whatever is wrong in SANE for me also — if I knew where in all that source code the mess is that prevents my wireless (Epson) scanner from being found on my (Comcast) network by SANEd. Which I have no clue about.

No way. Building a working SANEd version of XSANE or its successor is the job of the Ubuntu and SANE developers. They have fallen on their [behinds] in Ubuntu 16.04 and won’t admit it.  The first step in solving a problem is to admit that there is a problem. I am still waiting for the Ubuntu Developers to admit this is a problem.

So in the meanwhile, I’ll continue to use VueScan as I am using it, as long as this remains possible. I will be upgrading to Ubuntu 18.04 sometime next summer (2018) and I’ll see what effects that upgrade will have. I actually expect mostly good things — and some bad things.

-- rc primak

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