How To Stop Windows 10 Updates With Hidden Microsoft Tool

windows 10 preview — Microsoft's Windows 10 operating system on display. Reuters

Microsoft has an underpublicized tool to allow users to skip chosen updates and hide them from view, it has emerged.

Keen-eyed ZDNet spotted KB3073930 on Microsoft's website on Monday. In non-tech speak, Microsoft has a package on its Windows troubleshooter website which, when installed, gives the option to show, hide and skip both Windows updates and driver updates. While the page says the tool is intended for use with the Insider Preview version of Windows 10, ZDNet reports that the update works with the final version customers will receive on Wednesday.

The company seems to have changed course slightly on a previous policy, revealed in the terms and conditions of the final version of Windows 10, which meant that users had to install every update that came along. There were some exceptions, mostly for enterprise users.

The change will be good news for anyone struggling with a rogue driver update. Early adopters took to Twitter over the weekend to complain about a failing Nvidia GPU update. Without this package, users could have been caught in an endless struggle against an unwanted update.

#Microsoft in a nutshell forcing drivers through #Windows Update with no way to control it and the driver is Broken pic.twitter.com/zjDXPn831m
— Ahmed ElalfI (@VOIDWALK3R) July 27, 2015

@GabeAul WU is forcing a broken Nvidia GPU driver, & Win10 setting to disable driver updates doesn’t stop it. pic.twitter.com/TJ7COv2ZXy
— John Noonan (@JohnNoonan) July 26, 2015