XP Automatic Updates
Discussion
Need some advice from someone who knows XP better than I do.
Am acting as "IT support" for a friend of my fathers. He has a PC, with windows XP and a dial-up connection, which he uses to write letters and send some emails. I have discussed the XP Automatic Updates feature with him to explain what it does and how to deal with the "alerts" it displays when an update is available. The trouble is he is of an age that he easily forgets what you have told him so I am getting emails every couple of days regarding the "warnings" that get displayed when new updates are available.
Given his basic use of the PC and the fact he is on a dial-up connection could I just turn off the Automatic Updates feature ?
KJR
Am acting as "IT support" for a friend of my fathers. He has a PC, with windows XP and a dial-up connection, which he uses to write letters and send some emails. I have discussed the XP Automatic Updates feature with him to explain what it does and how to deal with the "alerts" it displays when an update is available. The trouble is he is of an age that he easily forgets what you have told him so I am getting emails every couple of days regarding the "warnings" that get displayed when new updates are available.
Given his basic use of the PC and the fact he is on a dial-up connection could I just turn off the Automatic Updates feature ?
KJR
viperdave said:
Or just set it to automatically download and install the updates rather than just notify or download and notify. At least that way he wont be calling up in a few weeks with a virus.
Viperdave,
I have the XP firewall and AVG running so these should take care of any virus threat.
KJR
Seems to work ok for my farther. Ok so they may take a while to download if something like IE7 or an SP decides to come down but it all happens in the background in spare bandwidth when hes online. If it needs a reboot it will either ask or the updates will be installed when he goes to shutdown.
I wouldn't run a windows pc connected to the Internet without the latest security patches, even if it is on dial up, firewalled or running AV. About the only exception is to get them onto a new build because I'm too lazy to dig out a technet cd but i do that on BB so its pretty quick. What happens when there is a security update to the firewall service. Being xp firewalled isn't going to stop an exploit of that if you don't have the patch.
Even better is to make sure they don't have admin rights also for the account they use all the time. With AV, Auto update and FW with no admin priverlages the pc will stay pretty clean.
I wouldn't run a windows pc connected to the Internet without the latest security patches, even if it is on dial up, firewalled or running AV. About the only exception is to get them onto a new build because I'm too lazy to dig out a technet cd but i do that on BB so its pretty quick. What happens when there is a security update to the firewall service. Being xp firewalled isn't going to stop an exploit of that if you don't have the patch.
Even better is to make sure they don't have admin rights also for the account they use all the time. With AV, Auto update and FW with no admin priverlages the pc will stay pretty clean.
slinky said:
Yes indeed you can..
Right click on my computer, choose properties, click on the Automatic Update tab and choose "Turn Off Automatic Updates"
Job done!
Right click on my computer, choose properties, click on the Automatic Update tab and choose "Turn Off Automatic Updates"
Job done!
If he's on SP2 you will also need to disable the security center. It will bitch and moan about updates being turned off. But easy enough to do.
If he wants to get the updates best bet might be to drop round, take the box home with you and bolt it on to your network, let it update, take it back. Bit of a faf i'll admit but shouldn't take all that long (an hour at most).
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