Chapter 3: Using and Avoiding Windows Update

In This Chapter

arrow.png Finding out the trouble with patches

arrow.png Choosing your update level

arrow.png Patching selectively

arrow.png Looking at a security bulletin

arrow.png Removing Windows patches

Windows Automatic Update is for chumps.

askwoodycom_vista.eps I’ve taken a lot of flak over the years for advising people to turn off automatic updating. If you’re sophisticated enough to be reading this book, you’re sophisticated enough to keep Windows from clobbering your system.

I think you should tell Windows to advise you when patches are available and then wait and see whether the patches do more harm than good before applying them to your PC.

Face it: You have to patch, sooner or later. Patching isn’t like brushing your teeth, where you can ignore it for a year or two and things turn smelly and then gradually rot and fall out. If you don’t patch today, by next month, your computer can look and act ...

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