Windows 10 October 2018 Update problems: how to fix them

Tech Radar ^ | November 23, 2018 | Matt Hanson

[fireman15]

Update: After pausing the rollout of the update and extensively testing the software to make sure most issues have been fixed, Microsoft has now made the Windows 10 October 2018 Update once again available to download. We will keep updating this guide with any new issues we find.

Some people have reported that they have encountered Windows 10 October 2018 Update problems since downloading and installing it.

If you’re running into Windows 10 October 2018 Update problems, we have you covered and have gathered up all the Windows 10 October Update problems and fixes right here in this convenient guide.

However, if you're suffering from a Windows 10 October 2018 Update problem that we haven’t covered, follow and tweet us and we’ll do what we can to find a solution. We’ll also continue to update this article with all the latest problems and fixes when we hear about them.

[wally_bert]

I plan to keep my W7 laptop until it dies.

The new W10 boxes seem have all kinds of random problems. Mostly little but annoying.

[SkyDancer]

My family runs Windows 7 Home Premium and will never give that up.

[wally_bert]

I have one of the few W7 boxes at the company.

[sushiman]

“My family runs Windows 7 Home Premium and will never give that up.”

Both my PCs are Windows 7 machines and I turned off auto udate on both after the big trouble MS had with security updates some months ago . I use both my PCs for just internet and email and so far have not had any problems .

[LeoTDB69]

Beware the top offer at that link. Several of the reviews said the serial numbers coming with the disk were illegal and blacklisted by MS so they couldn’t install.

I wish I had stayed on my old Win 7 and not updated.

[Paladin2]

It never hurts to have some VMs backed up off of the daily “production” computer.

Their portability is pretty awesome.

Unix was always deeply about being able to virtualize ‘most anything. Pretty Kool.

[Paladin2]

"I’ve heard that some people are still using Xp."

Yep, it's the only way to still use some of my apps [especially one to use in interrogating my 15 yr old cars' diagnostic link to get to all sorts of modules].

[catnipman]

windows 10 updates are relatively easy to disable:

1. disable the windows update service with the service manager

2. if it exists, uninstall the update helper program and/or disable the update helper service with the service manager

3. there are several update helper tasks that are easy to disable with task manager, which mostly is done to eliminate annoying screen displays and messages about updating ...

the ONLY way to achieve stability on a Windows 10 system is to disable all vestiges of the update subsystem as soon as you buy your system and NEVER update it again ... protect yourself from viruses by establishing a Limited User account in addition to an Administrator account and do all of your work on the Limited User account and only use an Administrator account for system maintenance activities like adding, removing and updating software and printers and the like from an Administrator account.

BTW, the same advice applies to Windows 7 and Windows 8 as well ...

[fireman15]

It never hurts to have some VMs backed up off of the daily “production” computer.

Good point. And I do like to try new things out on virtual machines. I have several primary systems set up, Windows 10, Windows 7, and Linux builds. I have a “Hyper-V switch” set up with an icon on my desktop so that I can use Hyper-V Manager and VM-Workstation on the same machine.

We have three other working laptops, one is a little 10” ultra-portable which cost less than $100 a couple years ago. another is my previous laptop which is literally falling apart mechanically, after I replaced the broken hinges the case started cracking around the new ones. The other is my wife's which is mostly off-limits to me. So I have become dependent on my newish laptop working. My old one was easy to pop a different hard drive in, but this one is kind of a pain to get the case apart.

Experimenting in a virtual machines helps to keep my newish laptop from getting screwed up. But with Microsoft's assistance it happens occasionally anyway.

[Paladin2]

I have a 256 GB Thumb Drive that I use for backups.

I should probably buy another and use it a a secondary level b/u device.

[fireman15]

windows 10 updates are relatively easy to disable:

This was one of the primary reasons I upgraded to “Pro”. I had started taking the updates again recently, but after my recent adventure I turned them off again. It is not as easy to do if you are using the "Home" version however.

Here are more specific instructions:

Solution 2.

Change the Setting of the Group Policy Editor

The Group Policy feature is not available in the Home edition. So, only when you run Windows 10 Professional, Enterprise, or Education, you can use the Group Policy Editor to change the settings to prevent Windows 10 from automatically updating.

The group policy editor will notify you of new updates without automatically installing them.

Press the Windows logo key + R then type gpedit.msc and click OK.

Go to Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Update.

Double-click Configure Automatic Updates.

Select Disabled in Configured Automatic Updates on the left, and click Apply and OK to disable the Windows automatic update feature.

Note: If you need to update your Windows version later, you can repeat the steps above, then select Enabled to turn on this feature, so that you can continue to download the updates.

https://www.easeus.com/todo-backup-resource/how-to-stop-windows-10-from-automatically-update.html

[fireman15]

Thumb drives are handy little devices. I tend to use SD and Micro-SD cards in USB adapters so that I can use them in my cameras as well as for backups, but it starts getting confusing when you have a bunch of them. So I use external hard drives as well because they are easier to keep track of.

[knighthawk]

You can roll-back the update or “re-install” Win 7

https://www.pcworld.com/article/3074020/windows/how-to-go-back-to-windows-7-or-8-after-an-unwanted-windows-10-upgrade.html

[trebb]

Yeah - my desktop needed a restart and was acting funny....no desktop icons and then empty icons,,,Start bar had icons but the Microsoft Edge icon was not in the hot spot....did a second restart and let it set for 10 minutes after reaching the login screen and it seems OK now.

Suppose I should fire up the laptop and see how it fares with the latest "undocumented features" Microsoft is feeding us....

[fireman15]

I was trying to check my update history this morning and somehow even with my group policies set to not allow automatic updates, Microsoft decided that this action was giving it permission to re-install this latest abomination. Unfortunately, its a little like Snots, Cousin Eddy’s dog on Christmas Vacation... once he gets started on your leg it is probably better to let him just finish his business. So I will soon find out if the second time goes better than the first.

[fireman15]

Win-7 Pro 64 is still available.

I have purchased Windows 7 Pro licenses, Windows 10 Pro licenses and Microsoft Office licenses through eBay for just a few dollars to use in virtual machines. People always say that these are scams, and I am sure that many of them are, but I have not had a problem from longtime sellers with good feedback. Even when I have had difficulty after a few months on one of my installs I received excellent customer support. I was sure I had been scammed, but I had just screwed up and rolled back my virtual machine to before I had registered the license with Microsoft.

You do not need to pay a small fortune for Windows 7 or Windows 10 Pro like in the Amazon Ad you linked to. The ones I purchased have all been from European sellers. I have no idea what their game is... licenses from recycled computers??? schools??? corporations??? Who knows... all I know is the licenses I purchased are still working and taking updates from Microsoft and show they are legit. Unless you are purchasing your license directly from Microsoft, it doesn't matter if you pay $5 or $500... your likelihood of being scammed are probably about the same. Others may disagree and I am sure that many have been scammed over the years.

[catnipman]

i didn’t find it that difficult to disable updates as i indicated in my post,which was on a W10 Home version ...

however, either way, Group Policy-wise or otherwise, disabling updates is beyond the capability of the average consumer ... so millions of people get their PCs trashed on a regular basis when Microsoft repeatedly sends faulty major “upgrades” once or twice a year that clobber parts of their systems ... I’m surprised that Microsoft hasn’t lost all of their W10 consumer customers by now ...

[fireman15]

I have purchased several Pro licenses through eBay to upgrade for just a few dollars each. None of them have gone bad so far. For me it was worth the small amount of money to get the group policy editor, the additional virtualization features, and some other minor advantages. The group policy editor allows one to disable and re-enable automatic updates without workarounds that might cause other issues.

[catnipman]

“For me it was worth the small amount of money to get the group policy editor” is very useful for lots of things ... i buy only Pro versions of MS OS’es ...

[fireman15]

So as a follow-up... Even after disabling automatic updates in the group policy editor in Windows 10 Pro... this nightmarish October surprise started updating all over again when I tried to check what other updates were available. So after it finished I restarted the laptop and it seemed to work OK for a few minutes. Then one of the other annoying “features” of Windows 10 started up. A complete scan of the system using Windows Defenders new anti-virus definitions. The computer became completely unusable. Of course you can’t stop it or even pause it once it gets started. I did a restart and the desktop wouldn’t even come up. The task manager would come up when I did a control-alt-delete and I could see it was the same processes taking 100% of my hard drive’s bandwidth.

So I actually had some work that I needed to do on it. So I shut it down and started up with F11 which on my laptop goes into recovery mode, and did a Windows restore back to the state the computer was in before the October surprise update. An hour later the laptop seemed to be ready to go, but even with the rollback the scan of the hard drive started up again and the computer was again unusable. After leaving it on all night to complete the scan it is working OK again this morning.

So I have decided to skip the problematic October update altogether. Microsoft has been futzing up people’s computers for two months now and they still have not got their act together. It is downright embarrassing. This major feature update is mostly about increased integration with your cell phone. To me this means it is all about Microsoft scheming to break into an area that they have lost to Apple and Android and not in their customers best interests. So this wasted the better part of two days for me, caused a great deal of irritation, and delayed work I wanted to do. I had to edit and upload over a hundred photos I took at an event on my old Windows 7 laptop.