Download but don't install Updates

[ChrisGreaves]

How the heck can I do this?
I swear I used to do it on earlier versions.

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I had thought that my settings for Updates were correct (as in the image), but Win7 insists on downnloading one update, installing it, then d/l the second, installing it etc.

I'd rather d/l the lot and then get the installation done later in the evening.

Question 1: Am I correct in thinking it used to work this way on at least one version of Windows?
Question 2: Is anyone here d/l and installing later on Win7?

The good news is that I have experimented with several re-installs, and am (as I type) staying up to date, but in my situation I'd rather make the trips to the library shorter, and do at home what can be done at home.
(Hence my practice of File saveAs in Firefox and a rumination of web pages at my leisure).

(signed) "Up-to-date and beginning not to enjoy it" of Toronto.

[ChrisGreaves]

How the heck can I do this?

(Minutes later ...)

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Maybe this is part of the answer.
Windows appears to believe it HAS d/l 14 updates and now invites me to initiate the actual changes to my system - but by restarting the system.

I say "part" because it has delayed the installation, but I am trapped now.
If I want to restart the system while I am here (shutting down the lapttop while I adjourn to the washroom for example), I'll face the installation cycle as soon as I fire up the laptop again, rather than being able until I have plodded home.

Again, I swear I used to be able to d/l the updates to the hard drive, and then explicitly request they be installed at a time of my choosing.

[viking33]

Leave the laptop on and do your thing and let it reboot. A lot of updates will partially DL and install but require the system to get out of the way while it completes the installation. Doesn't take that long.

[HansV]

You can continue working for now, and shut down the laptop when you want to go home.
When you turn it on again at home, Windows will finish the installation.

[ChrisGreaves]

Leave the laptop on and do your thing and let it reboot. A lot of updates will partially DL and install but require the system to get out of the way while it completes the installation. Doesn't take that long.

I know what you mean, Bob, but on a public access network, such as the local library, the d/l can take forever, and I'd rather dedicate the time to the d/l rather than hold up the d/l while each piddling install takes place.

I know where the time goes because BitMeter shows me the d/l stretches followed by long inactivity on the wire.

FWIW didn't we used to be able to d/l updates and install them later?

[ChrisGreaves]

You can continue working for now, and shut down the laptop when you want to go home. When you turn it on again at home, Windows will finish the installation.

That's part of the problem, for me at least.

Assuming I can get to the end of my work at the local public access without rebooting, when I get home Windows tells me to keep my hands off my computer (my computer !) until it has satisfied its narcissist whims.
Maybe when I get home I'd like to get into reading web pages or something else.
IMHO Windows ought to be able to install its stuff later, perhaps while I'm cooking supper (sulks).

I know that the five minutes (or whatever) it takes to install is minimal compared to my life span; it's true.
And I'm partly peeved because I'm wading through what - eight years of updates all at once - but it still bugs me.

I could swear that I used to be able to do what Win7 offers and "choose when to install", rather than submit to a diktat

(signed) "petulant little sod" of Toronto.

[ChrisGreaves]

How the heck can I do this?

(later, as the laptop threatens to go home by itself ...)
Another reason for deferring non-essential work is battery life.
I'd rather use the battery power to do essential stuff and leave non-essential stuff until i am once more hooked up to the mains.

[HansV]

Doesn't the public library provide mains outlets these days?

[ChrisGreaves]

Doesn't the public library provide mains outlets these days?

I live in Toronto, Hans, not Mobile Alabama {Your favorite city here}.

Each of the 99 branch libraries has at least one power outlet, otherwise they wouldn't be able to plug in the vacumn cleaner at the end of winter.

Yorkville, my home away from home, has two outlets under the table by the front door; those outlets are usually occupied by folks who'd rather watch movies on YouTube rather than download Important Updates from Microsoft.
There is a third outlet on the wall near the Audio Books shelves, and this is used by neophytes who don't mind if people trip over the cable stretched at ankle-level between the wall and the table, or else they must have ready access to a limitless supply of power blocks that don't have the thin cable yanked out at one end.

And anyway, I'm averse to racing up Bay Street to be there within five minutes of the doors opening.

Lillian Smith - my second local branch - has outlets ON the wooden tables, right next to the signs that say "These tables are for Children only", and I'm working on a sort-of elevator speech to point out that every human on the planet is a child.

Modern/renovated branches like Northern Districts have more power outlets per square something than the older branches, which, to be fair, were built and began operating back when people went to the library to borrow books.
Made of paper.

Bottom line still is that I, like many other people, think in terms of "taking my laptop to the library" without lugging a power brick and two cables just in case.
It's while I'm watching that little blue hard-drive light flicker and keeping an eye on the battery indicator (Who knew a little light could be such a drain on a battery, eh?) that I start wondering whether I'm a fool for not realising that the Updates-Instanter would take so much time, a fool, for not bringing the power-block with me, or whether I'd have been a bigger fool for lugging the power block up here only to find that all three outlets were occupied.

Oh, sorry, I forgot again and so I'm off to get the newspaper (hardcopy edition with crossword puzzle) from Ryerson, and then to get my teeth cleaned out at Six Points Plaza at noon; a process that takes less and less time each year as my teeth grind down to the gums ...

[HansV]

I live in Toronto, Hans, not Mobile Alabama

Well, since it's Mobile, you could have moved it to Ontario...

[ChrisGreaves]

Well, since it's Mobile, you could have moved it to Ontario...

I dunno.
Do they have tugs in Mobile?