A Neat XP Pro trick

[Bullitt]

oes the above window look familiar to you? As long as you’re using Windows XP with Automatic Update turned on, I bet you’ve seen it umpteen times. This annoying little window pops up whenever you finish updating your computer with new updates, prompting you to restart your computer. And guess what, it only offers you the option to Restart Now or Restart Later, which the latter would only make the window come back and haunt you 10 minutes later.

It interrupts workflow and always manages to popup at the wrong time. And if your luck is any worse than mine is, you might just hit Restart Now accidentally and lose all your unsaved work.

So how do you avoid it? I’ve always did so by not installing any updates until I’m sure that I’m ready to restart my computer. But with this trick that I’ve found today, we no longer have to do that!

Start / Run / gpedit.msc / Local Computer Policy / Computer Configuration / Administrative Templates / Windows Components / Windows Update / Re-prompt for restart with scheduled installations

You can configure how often it will nag you (I re-configured it for 720 minutes, which means I’ll be asked twice on a work day), or completely disable it.

The article says that you’ll need to reboot after that to have the setting take effect. But having experience messing with gpedit.exe (Group Policy Editor) in the past, I’ll share with you that all you need is to type under Command Prompt:

gpupdate.exe /force

And the change will take effect immediately. Neat eh? But unfortunately, it works only for XP Pro users. Another reason to upgrade that Home edition!

 

[Saint N Sinner]

Mine doesn't do that, mine automatically downloads the updates which can be seen by the yellow shield looking symbol in my right hand corner dash.

It install's my updates when I shut my system down meaning I don't get interupted.