Windows 7 users complain of unprovoked Windows 10 auto-upgrades (BOHICA hope ya like it)

PC World ^ | Mar 14, 2016 | Jared Newman

[dayglored]

As Microsoft auto-upgrades more PCs to Windows 10, some users are complaining that they weren’t adequately notified.

Reports of unwanted Windows 10 upgrades have been circulating for the past few days on Reddit and Twitter, after the last Patch Tuesday. These users say they never approved or initiated the upgrade, and were dragged away from their Windows 7 (or perhaps Windows 8) installs anyway.

This is all part of Microsoft’s plan, of course. Last October, the company announced that it would reclassify Windows 10 as a “Recommended” update from older versions starting in early 2016, at which point many more users would get the upgrade without explicit permission. That reclassification began on February 1, and auto-upgrades have been rolling out ever since. If complaints are reaching a higher volume now, perhaps it’s because the rollout is getting more aggressive.

Here’s what the Recommended update looks like, according to ZDNet’s Mary Jo Foley:

First, users will receive a notification saying their PCs are scheduled to receive Windows 10 in the next three or four days. Users can click a small link to cancel or postpone the update, but simply closing the window will cause the notification to appear again one hour before the scheduled update time. If users don’t cancel or postpone within that timeframe, the update will begin automatically.

At that point, the only way to back out of the Windows 10 update is to “Decline” the End User License Agreement that appears during the installation. This will cause the system to roll back to the previous Windows version (though this is a somewhat time-consuming process).

[glasseye]

I checked my updates last night.
10 was there, and it was selected, I unclicked the box.
None of the other upgrades were selected.
Microsoft is being ‘dirty’ on this one.
A wise person said, “your are either the customer or you are the product”.
There is a reason why 10 is free...

[McGruff]

You know instead of badmouthing Windows all the time maybe you could be helpful.

GWX Control Panel

This is a free tool that can remove and disable the 'Get Windows 10' notification area icon on Windows 7 and Windows 8. Recent versions can also disable 'Upgrade to Windows 10' behavior in the Windows Update control panel and do much more. See the user guide at the Ultimate Outsider blog. You can still download GWX Control Panel as a standalone executable if you don't like installers. Please see the "GWX CONTROL PANEL RELEASE NOTES" section at the user guide for MD5 and SHA-1 checksums of all official releases.

[PROCON]

But I’ve got the updates set on manual. Do you think MS will just eventually update my computer with WIN 10 anyway?

[DiogenesLamp]

Windows 7 users complain of unprovoked Windows 10 auto-upgrades (BOHICA hope ya like it)

How about Microsoft leave other people's property the F*** alone?

This is where I would like to find out who's responsible for this, and beat them stupid with a baseball bat.

[heights]

About an hour after I remarked on this yesterday on Free Republic, my secondary Computer, running windows 7, upgraded to Windows 10. Weird..

[DiogenesLamp]

It kind of sounds to me like users do not know that they can uncheck the upgrade to Windows 10 when doing other upgrades, updates, patches, etc. ;-)

The default condition should be having to check a box if you want an upgrade. Not "We will force you unless you tell us no!"

[ImJustAnotherOkie]

You stupid Windows 7 users just don’t know what’s good for you.

Whine and whine... /s/

[Bob434]

they will do it to you- you might as well leave now- many have- including myself- I’m dual booting now- I use windows 10 ONLY for running windows programs and games- and don’t allow it to access the Internet- when i wish to go online, I boot back into linux- I also have windows 10 in a virtual machine on my linux install so that i can access both operating systems at once i need be- I also make sure my virtual machine install of windows can’t access Internet- MS has lost me as a customer as far as using their machine for online access - windows mint is very easy to use- and not much different that windows really- very glad i made the switch- Norton Internet security was doing the same stinkin thing- forcing people’s computers to ‘wake’ to run some lousy remediation task every 10 minutes, meaning you couldn’t put your machine in sleep - I’ve had enough of software forcing their changes on us-

[spel_grammer_an_punct_polise]

“Microsoft is being ‘dirty’ on this one.”

I do not particularly like MS.

I always uncheck the Windows 10 install then check the other updates which apply. It has been that way since day one of the free upgrade to Windows 10.

It is as dayglored said in another post. Most home-users are at the mercy of MS and do not know about unchecking it.

[jessduntno]

“You know instead of badmouthing Windows all the time maybe you could be helpful.”

Hahahahahhahaha...it’s the Applehead gang. They don’t want to be constructive. They just want to putsch their agenda.

Bleating like sheep. Aaaaaaple good, windoooooooows baaaaaaaaaaad.

[Neidermeyer]

.....erasing my CD drive from my computer
******************
My video card is incompatible with win10 ... I sent MS an e:mail stating my computers identifying information and notifying them that if they force a win10 upgrade on my machine I will be suing them in small claims for any loss of productivity and the substantial cost to purchase and install a new video card so that I will even be able to roll back the “destruction of my work equipment”.

[T-Bird45]

Yeah, I went with a nice utility that pretty much throws the finger at Win10 upgrades, forced or not. GWX I think it’s called.

That's what our administrator put on all of our laptops, pending a conversion at some point this summer, including the first deployment of Surface tablets to replace laptops. I'm supposed to be in the first round so I'm sure it will be an adventure.

[Secret Agent Man]

We told you this was coming.

Microsquish warned you this was coming.

Time to fuch msoft up the can and go somewhere else.

[Bob434]

[[GWX I think it’s called.]]

I read up on that and a few others liek it, seems they install some crap on your computer- not sure about GWX though- There are a few programs that one can use after upgrading to windows 10 to turn off the spying too- but again- some users report they install crap on your computer too- with no way to opt out it appears-

Best thign to do in my opinion IF one doesn’t need windows online for heavy windows only stuff, and only needs it for light usage such as(ie using Internet mainly for browsing web, email, maybe doing cloud based work etc ) then linux mint woudl more than meet this criteria and is easy to use and learn- not much different than windows really (IF all you really want it for are those things i mentioned- it can get more complicated IF you get messing around with it trying to do things like running windows programs under it etc-)

[TexasTransplant]

**** “This is where I would like to find out who’s responsible for this, and beat them stupid with a baseball bat” ****

Skip the bat, I’m thinking an endless loop of Hillary Cackles and give them the option to upgrade their situation with a “Free” rusty dull butter knife.

[musicman]

GWX ROCKS!!! The program has ALL my puters Win10 FREE!! No more “pop-ups” on start up and lets you TURN OFF any attempt my Microsoft to mess with you installing ANYTHING relating to Win10. Can’t recommend it enough!!!!!

Here’s the link!!!!!!

http://blog.ultimateoutsider.com/2015/08/using-gwx-stopper-to-permanently-remove.html

Enjoy everyone!! No more Win10 crap!!.....(for now...)

Follow the download instructions and then the instructions for turning OFF all the Win10 stuff by a simple mouse click for each category.

[mercier]

Wow, this just happened to me this morning. I’m on with Dell support regarding my email accounts but I did reference the ‘ miracle of my new screen and told him I hated it but the techie gave no advice on escaping Mr.Gate’s clutches.

[onyx]

Thank you so much, dearest dayglored!

I’m pinging myself because my eldest granddaughter is coming here in a few days and she is an IT expert.

She’s my Taylor from the Cayman’s who DrO and I raised for all those years when she was a little girl of age 3 and he was still practicing medicine in San Diego. She’s all grown up now and residing in Cana-duh, finishing law school and working for Microsoft as an expert.

I’m going to have her set this cheap laptop exactly the way I want it. We do Team Viewer whenever I run into trouble.

:)

[twyn1]

Yup, just happened to me on Saturday morning — and I am pretty sure I clicked on the opt out button when I saw the “scheduled update” pop-up. Ah, well, so far it’s been fine ... but I haven’t tried to use any of the “new features” yet

[Bob434]

Simply go into windows update, click on update history on left, then click on installed updates up top on right, down a little bit- look for KB3o3558 and right click uninstall- you’ll have to restart machine- When you see the update again in future list- (it will reinsert itself i nthe update list when you go back into updates- it’s very sneaky- keep an eye out for it by doing manual updates, and individual updates, don’t just do updates automatically-) right click it and select ‘hide’ again

Also uninstall the following because they are doing windows spying on you too

* 3068708

* 3022345

* 3075249

* 3080149