How to avoid being "upgraded to Win 10" against your will?

[bphlpt]

This comes from our good friends over at MSFN.  I felt this was an important enough issue to be quoted directly here.  I would hope that Liam will make sure that Win Toolkit is set up such that users will not install these updates and/or share info back to MS unless that was indeed what they wanted and intended to do.  Forewarned is forearmed!
 

 

Assuming one has a system they don't want Microsoft trying to "upgrade" to WIndows 10 via Windows Update...
 
What KBs should we hide?

 
KB2952664
"Compatibility update for upgrading Windows 7"
This update helps Microsoft make improvements to the current operating system in order to ease the upgrade experience to the latest version of Windows.

KB2976978
"Compatibility update for Windows 8.1 and Windows 8"
Describes an update that improves the compatibility and upgrade experience in Windows 8.1 and Windows 8
This update performs diagnostics on the Windows systems that participate in the Windows Customer Experience Improvement Program in order to determine whether compatibility issues may be encountered when the latest Windows operating system is installed. This update will help Microsoft and its partners ensure compatibility for customers who are seeking to install the latest Windows operating system.

KB2990214
"Update that enables you to upgrade from Windows 7 SP1 to a later version of Windows"
It is an update to the Windows Update Client. It is a pre-requisite (for now) in order to be able to "update" to Windows 10 when it becomes available. This is the actual correct download link.

KB3021917
"Update to Windows 7 SP1 for performance improvements"
This update performs diagnostics in Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1) in order to determine whether performance issues may be encountered when the latest Windows operating system is installed. Telemetry is sent back to Microsoft for those computers that participate in the Windows Customer Experience Improvement Program (CEIP). This update will help Microsoft and its partners deliver better system performance for customers who are seeking to install the latest Windows operating system.
 
KB3022345 (probably not offered anymore because it was superseded by KB3068708, of which more below)
"Update for customer experience and diagnostic telemetry" in Windows 8.x and Windows 7 SP1
This update introduces the Diagnostics and Telemetry tracking service to in-market devices. By applying this service, you can add benefits from the latest version of Windows to systems that have not yet been upgraded. The update also supports applications that are subscribed to Visual Studio Application Insights.
This update has been replaced by the latest update for customer experience and diagnostic telemetry that was first released on June 2, 2015. To obtain the update, see KB3068708 Update (of which more below) for customer experience and diagnostic telemetry.

KB3035583
"Update enables additional capabilities for Windows Update notifications in Windows 8.1 and Windows 7 SP1"
This update enables additional capabilities for Windows Update notifications when new updates are available to the user. It applies to a computer that is running Windows 8.1 or Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1). Before you install this update, check out the Prerequisites section.
It installs GWX.exe which has the description “Get Windows 10″
More info (myce on Apr 05, 2015): Update for Win 7 and 8.1 silently installs Win 10 downloader
To remove this update easily, there's now also rn10950's "I Don't Want Windows 10" :thumbup

KB3044374
"Update that supports you to upgrade from Windows 8.1 or Windows Server 2012 R2 to a later version of Windows".
This article describes an update that supports you to upgrade from Windows 8.1 or Windows Server 2012 R2 to a later version of Windows. This update has prerequisites.
 
KB3046480
Update helps to determine whether to migrate..." for in Windows 8.1 and Windows 7
This update enables the system to determine whether to migrate the Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1 to a later version of Windows when you upgrade from Windows 8.1 or Windows 7 to a later version of Windows. This determination is based on the usage of the .NET Framework 1.1.

KB3050265
It is an update to the Windows Update Client for Windows 7 SP1.
This update addresses an issue in which system performance can be decreased during scans. This issue has the greatest effect on computers that have a small amount of physical memory. This update addresses an issue in which Windows Update scans can fail and generate a 0x8007000E error.General improvements are made to support upgrades to a later version of Windows.
 
KB3050267
It is an update to the Windows Update Client for Windows 8.1
A change is made on the log level for %windir%\WindowsUpdate.log to reduce the frequency of certain events from exhausting log space. Fixes an issue for managed computers in which managed computers have to update drivers as a set. Driver sets are not processed by Windows Update during shutdown, and are still available to be installed after you restart the computer.Fixes an issue in which the files of an update may not be found by Windows Update (0x80070002) if the download operation spans multiple sessions.General improvements are made to support upgrades to a later version of Windows.

KB3068708
Update for customer experience and diagnostic telemetry in Windows 8.1 and Windows 7 SP1
This update introduces the Diagnostics and Telemetry tracking service to in-market devices... <snip> This kind of update helps the overall application experience on Windows, by improving the current operating system for upgrade to the latest version of Windows. <snip> By applying this service, you can add benefits from the latest version of Windows to systems that have not yet upgraded.
 
KB3065987
"Contains some improvements to WU Client in Win 7 SP1 or Win Server 2008 R2 SP1." Suspect WU update... take care!

KB3065988
"Contains some improvements to WU Client in Win 8.1, Win RT 8.1, or Win Server 2012 R2." Suspect WU update... take care!
 
KB3075249
"This article describes an update that adds telemetry points to consent.exe in Win 8.1, Win RT 8.1, Win Server 2012 R2, Win 7 SP1, and Win Server 2008 R2 SP1. This update adds telemetry points to the User Account Control (UAC) feature to collect information on elevations that come from low integrity levels."
 
KB3075851
"This article describes an update that contains some improvements to Windows Update Client in Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1. This update also resolves an issue in which certain Windows Update operations fail when you install Windows Update Client for Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2: July 2015 (KB3065987) on Windows 7 Embedded editions." In other words: it fixes the mess created by KB3065987.
 
KB3080149
"This article describes an update for customer experience and diagnostic telemetry, for Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows 7 SP1, and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1."


 

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More info (InfoWorld on Apr 16, 2015): MS elaborates on KB 2990214, KB 3044374 Win 10 nagware!
 

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Summary:
 
Now, there are some of these updates that come in pairs (pairing revised after reading post #111):
KB2952664 for Windows 7 SP1 and KB2976978 for Windows 8.x.
KB2990214 for Windows 7 SPx and KB3044374 for Windows 8.1.
KB3050265 for Windows 7 SP1 and KB3050267 for Windows 8.1.
KB3065987 for Windows 7 SP1 and KB3065988 for Windows 8.1.

While the others are intended for both Windows 7 SP1 and Windows 8.x, namely:
KB3035583, KB3046480 and KB3068708 (which replaces KB3022345), KB3075249 and KB3080149
 
And there is, in addition, KB3021917 and KB3075851,  just for Windows 7 SP1.
 

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This list intends to cover both Windows 7 and 8. Some of the updates listed are offered to either 7 or 8, while others are offered to both. This list is a work in progress, which tends to grow with time. My main intent here is just to keep all relevant info as together as possible, for easy reference. Of course, the idea for this sticky post came from NoelC's post I quoted at the top of this very post.

 

Many thanks to NoelC for raising the issue and to dencorso for putting this summary together.

Cheers and Regards

Edited August 20, 2015 by bphlpt
added KB3044374

[compstuff]

Well that was surely an eye opener!!!! Thanks

[rhahgleuhargh]

Hello,

KB3075249 and KB3080149 (superseeds KB2882822) have been added by WU yesterday, they add some telemetry reports.

Should we hide those updates in the same way as previous Windows 10 migration required updates ?

[bphlpt]

First post above has been updated with the latest info from MSFN and both of those updates are mentioned.  I would hide them because of the telemetry aspects if nothing else.

 

Cheers and Regards

[rhahgleuhargh]

@bphlpt,

Thank you for the info. So I were right when I putted them in W10 category of Windows 7 ULs.

Seems like M$ became addicted to telemetry updates...

[crashfly]

This thread is very informative.  I appreciate the information provided.

 

For additional useful information, (and those that still want the updates but not windows 10), there is an option to make sure the OS does not offer you a Windows 10 upgrade.  [Yes this still allows the updates, but for those computers that you just do not want the end user attempting to upgrade to Windows 10, this works wonders.]

 

Save the following as a registry file and have Windows 7 load the file:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Gwx]"DisableGwx"=dword:00000001

[Dibya]

tHIS IS A COLd war between windows user and ms.

They will again undo this through every months updates

[mooms]

You could also use GWX Control Panel.