I am really not sure if Microsoft truly understands what is happening in the real world. Maybe they do not care or is there something else at play? They are smarter than this, aren’t they? Unfortunately they do not realize that the confidence of a once solid company is slowly breaking down. I run the Windows Vista 64-bit edition in my workplace and I have also experienced the “phantom update and restart”. There have always been Microsoft haters and I am not particularly one of them. Sure I have used Linux and Macs but I use them to complete a job or task. Microsoft needs to “re-think” how they do business. People may opt not to automatically update their system so that they can test or ensure that adverse issue will not take place. Overiding the will of the user is a blantent dictatorship, as far as I am concerned. I should be a Liberty, after purchasing their product, to do what needs to be done. Unfortunately, what has actually been lost is “confidence” and “trust”. Microsoft better start to realize soon that they are not the only game in town. Manipulating this issue, however which way they want to, is not helping the image. Microsoft can try to spin this issue but they have definaetely broken the trust of the user.

By: Adrian P
a.k.a “The G.T.A Patriot”
Toronto, Ontario

To read more from the article from ZDNET, see below.

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It’s time for the latest and possibly final installment of the seemingly never-ending saga of “Why is my copy of Windows automatically updating and rebooting itself?” Microsoft says users just don’t realize that their machines are set to update. They think users are to blame! Is Microsoft completely incompetent or are they lying?

In the last episode, the Windows Update Product team stated on its blog on October 12 that neither Automatic Update (AU) nor the bunch of patches that Microsoft rolled out on October 9, Patch Tuesday, were responsible for reports from Windows users earlier this month that their machines were automatically updating without their approval.

The Product Update team continued to investigate. At some point (I’m not sure exactly when, as the time stamp does not reflect the post update time/date) the team updated its blog again, suggesting a few possible causes for the reports by certain Windows users of their machines updating automatically. On the team’s list of possible reasons that AU settings can be (re)set or changed:

  • “During the installation of Windows Vista, the user chooses one of the first two recommended options in the “Out of Box Experience” and elects to get updates automatically from Windows
  • “The user goes to the Windows Update Control Panel and changes the AU setting manually
  • “The user goes to Security Center in Windows Vista and changes the AU setting
  • “The user chooses to opt in to Microsoft Update from the Microsoft Update web site
  • “The user chooses to opt in to Microsoft Update during the installation or the first run experience of another Microsoft application such as Office 2007.”

In short, Microsoft’s explanation was that users were knowingly or unknowingly changing their own Automatic Update settings and complaining about the results.

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