WSUS Offline Update - selecting updates by group?

[serpico]

Does WSUS Offline let you choose only "important updates"? Going to do a fresh install of Win 7 and thinking of using WSUS to avoid the Windows Update quagmire, but I don't want the telemetry updates. Will WSUS allow me to select only the "important updates" or maybe "optional updates" but without the telemetry updates?

Or are there other apps or services that automate the process of updating Windows while at the same time providing granular control over which updates get applied?

[olex126]

Run Steve Gibson's (of "Spinrite" fame) "Never10" program before you do the WSUS update...That will keep the telemetry at bay.

Regards.
Dave

[dr_st]

Run Steve Gibson's (of "Spinrite" fame) "Never10" program before you do the WSUS update...That will keep the telemetry at bay.

That's not true. Read the documentation on Never10's site.

Never10 does not enable/disable any Windows Updates. In particular, it does not have anything to do with telemetry updates. All Never10 does is toggle a particular registry setting, which controls one and only one aspect of the OS - whether it will be allowed to automatically upgrade to Win10 via Windows Update.

Never10 also has the ability to delete whatever files were downloaded to enable a Win10 automatic upgrade. Finally, in order to perform its task, Never10 has the ability to update your Windows Update client.

[w0qj]

We just do Windows 7 online Windows Update on our machines after a Product Recovery, choosing "Important Updates Only" (ie: "no" recommended upates).
The online Windows Update has been noticeably faster than before (we last did one Q4 2016).

Hope that M$ does not stuff too much telemetry down our Windows 7 throats!
(Which is why we refuse to upgrade to Win10 until the year 2020).

[dr_st]

Don't confuse telemetry with surveillance. Telemetry is a good thing designed to figure out how people use the product and what problems they run into, with the end-goal being an improvement of the product. Surveillance is an altogether different thing, and its end goals are rarely in the interest of the user. Unfortunately, recently the distinction between the two has been blurred.

[shawross]

Referring to Windows 7 updates "blurred" is apt also "murky" comes to mind.

In what we have witnessed with the release of Windows 10 it is difficult to believe that Microsoft has intentions of greatly improving Windows 7 today and into the future.

[dr_st]

it is difficult to believe that Microsoft has intentions of greatly improving Windows 7 today and into the future.

It's not merely difficult, it would be simply ridiculous to believe. Windows 7 is well into its extended support cycle (it went out of mainstream support in January 2015). This means that Microsoft will not be (and has not been) improving it in *any* way, great or small; in the extended support phase the OS gets no new features, only security patches and critical bug fixes. Microsoft has always made this policy clear and upfront.

Luckily for fans of the OS, Windows 7 managed to catch a lot of the key technologies before it went out of mainstream support, which allow it to remain useful for modern software.

[w0qj]

Well, Windows 7 64-bit looks like the equivalent of Windows XP 32-bit back in the day

OK, the only thing that bothers me is that for some very old DOS games, you need DOSBox for 64-bit Win7.
Perhaps one day when Win7 support ends, we'll put in a 32-bit of Win7 into Hyper-V to run these very old DOS games, so as to avoid using DOSBox.
(Otherwise if we use Hyper-V to run Win7 64-bit and DOSBox, we would be running a virtual PC within a virtual PC. Imagine that!)

[shawross]

Yes users of Windows 7 are in the "Extended Support Stage" but Microsoft is still labeling update packages as "Improvements and Fixes".

Maybe these "Improvements" are for Microsoft like adding Telemetry monitoring and spying for Windows Explorer. I would argue that MS can't be trusted and what they are sending users is "blurred and murky".

For April as usual I am only installing "Security Only Updates" and these total 38 MB while the "Quality Updates" package is 160 MB although I think this contains March updates.
Being in extended support phase what are all these extra updates which many users probably automatically update?

[sktn77a]

We just do Windows 7 online Windows Update on our machines after a Product Recovery, choosing "Important Updates Only" (ie: "no" recommended upates).
The online Windows Update has been noticeably faster than before (we last did one Q4 2016).

Well, the problem is that online Windows updates has caused all kinds of headaches for many, many, Win 7 users. Most common problem is that Windows Update just hangs and never (EVER) goes anywhere. That is why users have started installing the updates offline.

[dr_st]

We just do Windows 7 online Windows Update on our machines after a Product Recovery, choosing "Important Updates Only" (ie: "no" recommended upates).
The online Windows Update has been noticeably faster than before (we last did one Q4 2016).

Well, the problem is that online Windows updates has caused all kinds of headaches for many, many, Win 7 users. Most common problem is that Windows Update just hangs and never (EVER) goes anywhere. That is why users have started installing the updates offline.

Word is that Microsoft finally fixed it somewhat for Win7, but you do need to install the servicing stack update first.