Windows Update Settings

To view the current windows update settings, click on the "Windows Updates" tab, then select "Settings".

At the top of the page is a "Computer/Group" selector, which lets you select the computer or group whose settings you wish to edit. Click on the "Change" button to select a computer or group.

Monitoring

By default, windows update monitoring is enabled for the "All Computers" group. Set the monitoring state by selecting values from the "Update Monitoring" drop down list.

Automatic Updates

This section lets you configure the automatic installation of updates.

Automatic Installation

This dropdown box sets whether or not automatic installation is Enabled/Disabled/Not Set. If it is Not Set, then the settings for this group have no effect on the final settings for a computer that belongs to this group.

Schedule

You can define the schedule for automatic updates by pressing the "Edit" button. For more information about setting up a schedule, see Editing a Schedule

Reboot After Install

If you want to allow the computer to be automatically rebooted after installing updates, set this to "If Needed" or "If Needed (and Force App Close)". If you never want to reboot after installing updates, set this value to "Never". Keep in mind that if you do allow reboots after install, the computer will only be rebooted if an installed update requires it.

Include Updates

Set this filter to the updates you want to automatically install. For more information on update filters, see Update Filters

Exclude Updates

Set this filter to the updates you don't want to automatically install. For more information on update filters, see Update Filters

More about Update Filtering

To select which updates to install, you can setup two groups of filters shown above, "Include Updates" and "Exclude Updates". When the OptiTune client is directed to automatically install updates using the "Automatic Installation" setting above, and then schedule is met, it will scan for all available updates on the client computer. From this list of available updates, only the updates which meet the "Include Updates" filter will be chosen. Next, any updates which meet the "Exclude Updates" filter will be discarded. Finally, the list of remaining updates will be installed.

Group Policy

When you make configuration changes in the "Automatic Updates" section above (after "Monitoring"), this is only going to affect what the OptiTune agent does with regards to Windows Updates, but not what Windows itself does.

You can also control how Windows itself handles updates using the settings in the "Group Policy" section. Note that this may have limited effect in the non-enterprise versions of Windows 8 and Windows 10.

For example, to prevent windows itself from automatically installing updates (on supported operating systems), change the "Group Policy - Automatic Updates" setting to "Enabled", and select "2 - Notify for download and auto install"

On Windows 10 or above, you can also enable Peer to Peer (P2P) sharing of Windows Updates to save on bandwidth, using the "Download Mode" setting.

Automatic Updates

This setting lets you configure the behavior of the Automatic Updates service in Windows itself, through Group Policy.

Change this setting to "2 - Notify for download and auto install" if you don't want Windows to perform any automatic updates on its own, and only want to manage automatic updates through OptiTune.

Specifies whether this computer will receive security updates and other important downloads through the Windows automatic updating service.

This setting lets you specify whether automatic updates are enabled on this computer. If the service is enabled, you must select one of the four options in the Group Policy Setting:

  • 2 - Notify for download and auto install
    When Windows finds updates that apply to this computer, users will be notified that updates are ready to be downloaded. After going to Windows Update, users can download and install any available updates.

  • 3 - Auto download and notify for install
    Windows finds updates that apply to the computer and downloads them in the background (the user is not notified or interrupted during this process). When the downloads are complete, users will be notified that they are ready to install. After going to Windows Update, users can install them.

  • 4 - Auto download and schedule the install
    The default schedule for all installations will be every day at 3:00 AM. If any updates require a restart to complete the installation, Windows will restart the computer automatically. (If a user is signed in to the computer when Windows is ready to restart, the user will be notified and given the option to delay the restart.)

  • 5 - Allow local admin to choose setting
    With this option, local administrators will be allowed to use the Windows Update control panel to select a configuration option of their choice. Local administrators will not be allowed to disable the configuration for Automatic Updates.

If the status for this policy is set to Disabled, any updates that are available on Windows Update must be downloaded and installed manually. To do this, search for Windows Update using Start.

If the status is set to Not Configured, use of Automatic Updates is not specified at the Group Policy level. However, an administrator can still configure Automatic Updates through Control Panel.

Download Mode

This setting lets you configure the download method used by Delivery Optimization, in Windows 10 computers or above.

Specifies the download method that Delivery Optimization can use in downloads of Windows Updates, Apps and App updates.

The following list shows the supported values:

  • 0 - HTTP only
    HTTP only, no peering

  • 1 - LAN
    HTTP blended with peering behind the same NAT.

  • 2 - Group
    HTTP blended with peering across a private group. Peering occurs on devices in the same Active Directory Site (if exist) or the same domain by default. When this option is selected, peering will cross NATs. To create a custom group use Group ID in combination with Mode 2.

  • 3 - Internet
    HTTP blended with Internet Peering.

  • 99 - Simple
    Simple download mode with no peering. Delivery Optimization downloads using HTTP only and does not attempt to contact the Delivery Optimization cloud services.

  • 100 - Bypass
    Bypass mode. Do not use Delivery Optimization and use BITS instead.