Windows Update Agent 7.6.7600.320

[The Original Ralph]

Okay, a thread just got shut down because somebody semi-hijacked it to a conspiracy theory that windows is conspiring to force folks to upgrade to W10

I'm running win 7 x64 w/SP1 - the question i have is why windows is insisting on downloading updates when i've selected "let me know when updates are available but let me choose which to download", and it changed 4X in one week to download & install, on it's own,

Today i spent 7 hours re-installing win 7 and all my programs, and the first thing i did when windows was installed was to set update setting to "never". Two hours later i found "Windows update agent 7.6.7600.320 downloaded and installed. And it will not un-install.

I found settings thru out my computer changed, and even the little icon to "safely remove hardware and eject media" now opens my Printer and Devices folder. Yeah, i know i can perform those tasks there, but the original way worked fine. And one of the issues is windows explorer can now not find Windows Updates so i can check settings haven't been changed again.

AND HOW IS IT WINDOWS DEEMS IT HAS THE RIGHT to over ride my choices and download without my permission.

I did a search on that update, and there are a lot of folks experiencing problems that are associated with that download.

Please tell me why i shouldn't feel Bill Gates is trying to force folks to upgrade to W10?

Again, the nerve / arrogance to download something without my permission, what is this, pre-1990s Russia, where mother Gates knows best for me?

I tried to email that GWX utility (that blocks / remove W10 and it's app) to a friend, and microsoft wouldn't deliver it - message came back that it could not be delivered - and folks are not supposed to be suspicious?

and before someone steps in and tells me how i have the right to go to linux, ubuuntu etc, sure - tell me where i go to collect my refund. Let me sell you a car, then after you've driven it for a while, i come along and change the suspension, or modify it in a way you didn't agree to, and you might appreciate how i'm feeling, and wondering how anyone can think like that (one of the mods suggested that in the thread that got locked down). Maybe a better analogy would be if i came in and took 6th out of the transmission, under the logic of, as the vendor i feel no one needs to go that fast, and after all, as the vendor or maybe the mfgr, i must know better. That'd be acceptable, wouldn't it????

 

[ahnilated]

Is your computer on a domain? If so the domain rules over ride your local rules.

 

[Wolfshadw]

I've been running Windows 7 x64 SP1 ever since it was released on my HTPC. I've never had a problem with unauthorized downloads from anyone, to include Microsoft. My update settings are set to never check for updates (not recommended). I'll admit I am less than diligent on manually running updates on that system, but as it's only my HTPC (live TV, movies, and music), I don't need to be running the latest updates as they come out.

I'll have to check to see what version updated I have installed, but it should be the latest or close to it as I have run updates within the past couple of months.

I tried to email that GWX utility (that blocks / remove W10 and it's app) to a friend, and microsoft wouldn't deliver it - message came back that it could not be delivered - and folks are not supposed to be suspicious?

Did you try to send the utility as an exe file or did you ZIP It first? Many mail systems will simply refuse any e-mail that has an exe attachment.

and before someone steps in and tells me how i have the right to go to linux, ubuuntu etc, sure - tell me where i go to collect my refund.

The problem here is that you're not purchasing the software. You are leasing the right to use it and part of that agreement is that Microsoft has the right to change it as they deem fit. Using your car metaphor, you can terminate the lease at any time, but you won't get any money back from the time that you did use it. That's pretty much standard with any software package. You don't purchase the software. You purchase the right to use the software and there is typically a clause in the terms of use that states, the developers can do as they please.

Another analogy would be any computer game that "nerfed" a class of character because player found a way to make the character too strong. You played the game for six months, they "nerfed" your character's class and now s/he's not as powerful. You may quit the game, but do you really expect to get a "refund"?

-Wolf sends

 

[The Original Ralph]

while i understand what you're saying, i do not recall microsoft saying "lease our software" but "why you should buy windows xxx"

okay, so i rent you a house, and after you've signed the lease and lived there for six months, you come home and find i've removed the hot tub - you wouldn't be upset?? and rightfully so? Whether this was an outright purchase or a "lease" (a license to use is not really like a lease, btw), changing the product, unilaterally is not acceptable.

 

[The Original Ralph]

Is your computer on a domain? If so the domain rules over ride your local rules.

have absolutely no idea what you're asking - i'm a single workstation user, with direct access to the internet via my svc provider, which is verizon

but do not understand how a "domain" could come in and change my windows update settings

and i'm not the only one reporting the "un-permitted" download - google that update on the web

 

[Wolfshadw]

Computers on a domain are those computers, attached to a network and authenticate user IDs and passwords through a central, networked computer used almost solely for that purpose. Once authenticated, domain computers have access to shared network drives and other network features, but are also controlled by domain policies (more commonly referred to group policies). Those policies would override any local update policies you have set on the domain computer.

However, since you are not on a domain computer, the above was just for educational purposes.

And I stand corrected. You are correct in that you do not "lease" the software from Microsoft. You do, however, purchase a license to use the software. Either way, they still have the right and ability to change the software as they deem fit. It's all explained in their End User License Agreement (EULA) and if you choose not to accept that, then, and only then, do you have the capability of requesting a refund. Of course, you have to accept the EULA at the time of installation.

Once you accept the EULA, you no longer have a say in how MS wants to save you from yourself. It's at this point that you need to remember that 99.9999% of Windows users are not as knowledgeable as you and I. If you asked them if they updated their drivers, they'd probably think you were asking if you changed chauffeurs. This is why Microsoft implements the policies that they do. In the VAST majority of cases, they actually do know better. You, I, and a minority of Tom's Hardware registered users are such a small community that Microsoft doesn't even consider us when making policy.

The statement, "Why you should buy Windows xxx" is directed at all of us, but they're not overly concerned about the 0.0001% of their customers who have an actual grievance against their policies.

And think about it. If you have a product and you sold 10,000 copies of said product. Out of those 10,000 customers, one person (just one) says, "Hey, I don't like they way you implemented this change.". Are you really going to spend millions of dollars to set up a secondary development team to meet that one customers desires or are you simply going to change your EULA to essentially say, "Don't like it? Don't use it!"

I'm pretty sure that's where your linux recommendations from your previous thread sprung from.

-Wolf sends

 

[Saga Lout]

I suspect that having given anyone who wanted it, to have Windows 10 free up to July 29th this year, they will announce they want a rental fee to keep it another year. Sometime around July 29th next year, I expect that to start happening and I'll happily bet one British pound on the rent being around $25.

They already rent out Office 365 so why not with 10? I reckon they'll drop the 10 bit and just call it Windows and any future changes will just be updates.

I'd love to be wrong about this but I believe they realise folks won't keep coughing up huge amounts of money every few years on something that simply doesn't get much better. They woke up to that after the Windows 8 fiasco.

When your only competitor is free of charge, you have to be pragmatic.

 

[The Original Ralph]

Computers on a domain are those computers, attached to a network and authenticate user IDs and passwords through a central, networked computer used almost solely for that purpose. Once authenticated, domain computers have access to shared network drives and other network features, but are also controlled by domain policies (more commonly referred to group policies). Those policies would override any local update policies you have set on the domain computer.

However, since you are not on a domain computer, the above was just for educational purposes.

And I stand corrected. You are correct in that you do not "lease" the software from Microsoft. You do, however, purchase a license to use the software. Either way, they still have the right and ability to change the software as they deem fit. It's all explained in their End User License Agreement (EULA) and if you choose not to accept that, then, and only then, do you have the capability of requesting a refund. Of course, you have to accept the EULA at the time of installation.

Once you accept the EULA, you no longer have a say in how MS wants to save you from yourself. It's at this point that you need to remember that 99.9999% of Windows users are not as knowledgeable as you and I. If you asked them if they updated their drivers, they'd probably think you were asking if you changed chauffeurs. This is why Microsoft implements the policies that they do. In the VAST majority of cases, they actually do know better. You, I, and a minority of Tom's Hardware registered users are such a small community that Microsoft doesn't even consider us when making policy.

The statement, "Why you should buy Windows xxx" is directed at all of us, but they're not overly concerned about the 0.0001% of their customers who have an actual grievance against their policies.

And think about it. If you have a product and you sold 10,000 copies of said product. Out of those 10,000 customers, one person (just one) says, "Hey, I don't like they way you implemented this change.". Are you really going to spend millions of dollars to set up a secondary development team to meet that one customers desires or are you simply going to change your EULA to essentially say, "Don't like it? Don't use it!"

I'm pretty sure that's where your linux recommendations from your previous thread sprung from.

-Wolf sends

I was somewhat in rant mode last night, so apologies

but it looks like i'm off to the land of linux

 

[The Original Ralph]

but it's news like this http://www.tomshardware.com/news/netflix-kaby-lake-cpu-4k,33070.html that doesn't do a lot to
dissuade the conspiracy minded users

What The Flix? Netflix 4K Streaming Requires Kaby Lake, Windows 10, Edge Browser

it's not the 4 episodes of "Gilmore Girls" but the pattern of conduct that keeps becoming apparent

 

[ahnilated]

but it's news like this http://www.tomshardware.com/news/netflix-kaby-lake-cpu-4k,33070.html that doesn't do a lot to
dissuade the conspiracy minded users

What The Flix? Netflix 4K Streaming Requires Kaby Lake, Windows 10, Edge Browser

it's not the 4 episodes of "Gilmore Girls" but the pattern of conduct that keeps becoming apparent

That is the reason everyone raised the red flag when they stared with UEFI. We were headed down the road to Media companies running your computer and telling you what and when you can see something.

 

[Wolfshadw]

Ah yes... Conspiracy under the guise of forward progress. 😉

The reason companies make these decisions is so they don't have to make their technologies backwards compatible. It's kind of like setting up a Minimum Systems Requirement for games. As long as you meet the minimum specs, we'll help and support you if you run into issues. Again, they're not going to spend millions of dollars setting up an R&D team to support outdated spec'ed machines. If you don't meet the minimum specs, our only response will be update your system.

This sort of thing isn't anything new. If you want to read my personal experience with it, click the (long winded) spoiler below. The bottom line is, those of us on the cutting edge (or wanting to be) have to pay the price of staying there. By the time "cutting edge" becomes "commonplace", there's a significant portion of the user base that's already there.

Spoiler

This sort of thing has been happening since home computers became popular. The first computer I owned was a Commodore Amiga 500. Performance-wise and in graphics, it completely wiped the floor with any Windows based computer, but I'd go to the store to look for a new game and the Windows section was huge. The Amiga section? Maybe two shelves. I learned then, if you wanted to run the popular software, you needed to run the popular hardware.

So I purchased a new AST 486 DX2-50 with a whopping 512KB of RAM and Windows 3.11. Around that time, Windows 95 was being introduced. Problem was, Windows 95 required 4MB of RAM. I didn't worry about it until I started seeing the cool games coming out that required Windows 95. They wouldn't run under Windows 3.11 or DOS 6.0. So I upgraded my RAM and purchased my copy of Windows 95. Now I could play Doom II and my Babylon 5 CD and all of it's media.

I ran that system happily for a couple of years, but my computer was starting to slow down. I was getting more into productivity and had made the switch from Windows 95 to Windows NT4. Here I was with my PC running on 4MB and new computers were coming out with new Pentium processors and ungodly amounts of RAM like 256MB or even 512MB.

That's when I built my first computer. An Intel PIII-800 with 128MB of RAM, running Windows NT4. That system ran perfectly through my Windows 2000 days and until the start of my XP days. There was a new game coming out that a lot of my friends were itching to play. It was a newer type of game. They called it a Massively Multi-player Online Role Playing Game (MMORPG) called City of Heroes. And even though we were separated by thousands of miles, we could all still get together in this online realm and play this game as Super Heroes! How could I not join in? However, before I could join my friends, the old computer needed another upgrade. 1GB (4x256MB) of RAM and a discrete graphics card. An ATI Radeon 9200 AGP.

Unfortunately, that system did not survive my next move. It had been seven years since I built that PC and I didn't have the time to research and build a new computer, so I ran to the local CompUSA and purchased an emergency replacement (had to get back to City of Heroes), but there was a problem. There was this new technology being phased in called PCI Express; a new interface for graphic cards, but not compatible with the older AGP cards. Well, I couldn't afford a new computer AND a new graphics card, so I had to buy a computer that still supported AGP cards. Besides, they're not going to phase out AGP cards any time soon, right?

Fortunately, I was right and new AGP cards kept coming for a few more years. What I didn't expect was around Issue 6 of City of Heroes where NCSoft announced they had updated the core of the game and that I would need a better graphics card and my old ATI Radeon 9200 wouldn't handle the game anymore. I was outraged! How could they change the specifications of the game? I had be paying my subscription and playing the game faithfully for years and they come up with this??? There goes another $300 on my 7800GS AGP card.

Things were fine for a few years and I eventually built a new system based on an ASRock 939Dual-SATAII motherboard. The motherboard was perfect for me because it supported both AGP and PCI-Ex16 graphic cards. For a while, I used it with my 7800GS and then eventually with my ATI Radeon All-In-Wonder X1800XL TV Tuner Card.

Then there was the switch from XP to Windows 7 (I skipped Vista), but the HDCP compliance embedded in 7 meant you could no longer use an analog TV Tuner Card like my $300 ATI All-In-Wonder X1800XL, it became all but obsolete. It still worked as a graphics card, but my live TV on my computer days were over until I bought an HDCP compliant TV Tuner card.

The latest insult was when Microsoft decided to remove Windows Media Center from Windows 10 and discontinue support. My latest TV Tuner Card, a Ceton InfiniTV4 cable card's software was based around Windows Media Center. Sure, there were workarounds available, but if it ain't broke, don't fix it. So up until last weekend, I continued to run Windows 7 SP1 on my HTPC (which again, has never tried to update on it's own, since I uninstalled KB3035583).

So yeah. I've literally got thousands of dollars worth of functional, but obsolete equipment sitting in boxes in my closet at the moment. Thousands of dollars and thousands of hours put into my computer habit; all made pointless today in the name of progress.

Is it a conspiracy? No. It's just game developers, Microsoft, and the government doing what they think is in the best interests for the masses. The 0.0001% who actually know better? Well, our voice just isn't that strong and by the time Netflix 4K streaming becomes a common thing, most of us will have discarded out perfectly functional computers for Kaby Lake/Windows 10 systems anyway.

-Wolf sends

 

[Wolfshadw]

I'll amend that last comment:

By the time "cutting edge" becomes "commonplace", the bet is there's going to be a significant portion of the user base that's already there.

-Wolf sends

 

[The Original Ralph]

yeah, but the problem with your perspective is you're ignoring I WAS HAPPY WITH THE WAY WIN 7 RAN before

since the complete re-installation yesterday, and the surprise download of that update package, i've had windows explorer stop working a half dozen times, and a number of other issues i've had to explore on the web. I'd rather spend my time enjoying my computer or using it, rendering videos etc than researching the various anomalies that crop up - and the big issue i have, whether i own it or just own a license to use it, it's or rather it was my right to choose what i wanted installed.

I'm just not into being told what's best for me, especially when it's usually not - like the gov't, one size fits all doesn't work.
Up until a couple of months ago i had a very stable system that functioned well and was stable for two years, since i built this rig - and even if i am running the risk of security exposure, i'd rather microsoft left my copy of windows alone

the first guy that comes out with a small utility that blocks any intrusions from windows, will have my money

 

[Wolfshadw]

No. I'm not missing that perspective. With every forced upgrade, regardless of who initiated it, I was extremely happy with my system before the upgrade. I think what you might be missing is that on my system, Windows Updates are not forced. I cannot explain why your settings keep changing. I can only state that mine do not.

As for being told what's best for us, you need to remember that we who know what we are doing are the VAST minority and corporations do not answer to us, even if we do purchase their products.

-Wolf sends

 

[The Original Ralph]

google the update in the title, and you'll find I'm not alone in experience unexplained changes in update settings as well as discovering update downloads with the "never update" setting selected

 

[Wolfshadw]

I'm not arguing the point. I'm just saying on my system, I do not get automatic updates.

-Wolf sends

 

[The Original Ralph]

but the issue i have with your position is that you're focus'd on the benefits that the all knowing mothership, ie microsoft, and that it will be benevolent in it's control of our computers, while their real intent is kind of blatantly obvious in that netflix story i linked above - they want you and me captive customers, no matter how crappy their product line, ie Edge browser - what a joke.

Your acceptance is kind of alarming to me - i'm an old fart and probably a little less trusting than you, no ... make that a lot less trusting.

A friend is a retired microsoft engineer, and i've already asked him to come up with a small utility that will block any stealth downloads from microsoft, and until he or someone comes up with one, my video rendering machine will run win 7 pro totally offline, and microsoft can kiss my backside.

 

[Wolfshadw]

I never said they were benevolent. I know full well Microsoft wants us as captive customers, but as long as they don't go too far, most people don't really care (or are completely oblivious). Remember the uproar when Microsoft tried to force all Windows users to use Internet Explorer as opposed to the better option, Netscape? I predict the same thing will happen this Netflix/Edge alignment. If people are really concerned about being forced to use Edge, they'll either demand to be able to use a browser of their choice (assuming an update to Chrome/Firefox includes the correct DRM settings) or they'll opt for some other 4K video streaming service.

As far as stealth downloads, do you seriously think all of those security updates with vague descriptions are actually security updates? Why would they bother with a stealth download when they can code whatever they want and just call it a security update?

-Wolf sends

BTW - If your US based, Happy Thanksgiving!

 

[The Original Ralph]

......

BTW - If your US based, Happy Thanksgiving!

THanks - and apparently microsoft decided to send me a little thanksgiving gift, in spite of settings showing "never update" - note the date of the stealth download