Keeping a Windows PC Up-to-Date is a Nightmare (Premium)

When it comes to Windows 10 complaints, crapware, ads, and endless system updates top the list. But there’s another issue that gets little attention. And that needs to change.

Like all Windows 10 users, I have several applications on my PC that do exactly the same thing but in completely different ways: Update the software on my PC. That isn’t just inefficient, it’s unsophisticated. And while it’s possibly beyond Microsoft’s power to completely solve this problem, perhaps it could lead by example.

Looking just at the PC I’m currently using, I see the following:

Windows Update. This is, of course, where Microsoft updates Windows with feature and quality (cumulative) updates. You will also receive some hardware drivers from here, in particular those for Intel system components. The problem? The hardware drivers delivered by Windows Update are constantly out-of-sync with the versions delivered by the PC maker, via their own updating software (see below) and via Intel itself (see below). And I’ve found myself in a never-ending cycle of each software updater overwriting the driver another had previously installed.

Microsoft Store. Microsoft uses the Microsoft Store app to update the Store apps that are included with Windows 10, as well as those installed manually by the user. Like Windows Update, this mechanism work automatically, but I’m struck by how often there are many, many app updates waiting to install whenever I check manually. One wonders why this doesn’t work more efficiently.

Intel Driver & Support Assistant. Those with Intel-based PCs running the latest version of Windows 10 are advised to install this bizarre notification area applet that will supposedly keep your Intel-based hardware drivers up-to-date. But when there is an update, it launches a website in your browser. And then you have to manually download and install each update yourself, one at a time. And since this is Intel, virtually every update requires its own reboot. This is exactly the kind of behavior a normal user should never be subjected to.

HP Support Assistant. This PC happens to be an HP, but every PC from every major PC maker ships with software designed specifically to support its PCs, not just with software updates but also with support services, and promotions. Most of this software is terrible, but give HP credit for being able to stand out even in this crowd, as HP Support Assistant is particularly bad. It often triggers reboots when I’m not expecting it, and when I check for drivers manually, there’s always at least one—in this case, for Thunderbolt—that never installs correctly with no way to troubleshoot it. Worse, you need to manually babysit—and then confirm the success of—each driver install. This software is terrible.

NVIDIA GeForce Experience. OK, this one isn’t actually on the PC I’m writing this on, but it’s common. And if you do have a PC with an NVIDIA graphics card, you’ve no doubt entered into a hate-hate relationship with GeForce Experience, NVIDIA’s unbelievably slow and manual display driver updater. This software is like HP Support Assistant but for just a single hardware device, which is to say terrible. It is astonishingly how often it requires a driver update, and how long the process takes each time.

Depending on your PC—and on the hardware and software you’ve installed—you probably have plenty of other updaters waiting in the wings. All of your desktop applications must have their own updating mechanisms, of course. Hardware devices often do too, like my Microsoft mouse, which offers basic functionality out of the box but really requires special software called Microsoft Mouse and Keyboard if you want to customize it at all. Why this software isn’t automatically offered as an optional install via Windows Update is unclear. As is why Windows Update no longer even offers optional installs.

But it’s not just the sheer number of places you can go for updates. It’s that each of these is, in some way, work. If you dig back in your memory, you may recall that the entire point of the PC revolution and, later, the broader personal computing revolution that includes cloud services and smart mobile devices, was to make life easier for us. We were supposed to be served all day by our digital underlings.

But the reverse has happened. So while we allow our smartphones to interrupt us endlessly with pointless notifications in a modern form of Chinese water torture, we also allow ourselves to become slaves to our PCs and their many updating mechanisms. These updates aren’t just numerous, they’re interactive too. Most of what I describe above is a manual process, where the onus is on the user to both know about these options and then remember to check them from time-to-time. And then hand-hold them in many cases to completion. Are you freaking kidding me?

Worst of all, I don’t see an easy path forward. The original promise of Windows Update, which when first launched in Windows 98 as a web browser-based front-end to a back-end cloud service called Microsoft Update, was that this system would evolve and become more inclusive.

Initially, Windows Update would service Windows. And then Microsoft Office too. And then other Microsoft applications, services, and drivers. Then, over time, key third-party applications would come on board, so that you could update an app like Adobe Reader from that central location instead of through an Adobe-specific updater. Then, Windows Update would be opened to all applications and drivers. And we’d arrive at some future nerdvana where a single mechanism updated everything in Windows for us.

We did get some parts of this dream, of course. But there are many reasons why the full dream was never realized. PC makers, most obviously, do not want to cede a key point of user interaction to Microsoft because doing so would make it harder for them to sell you an extended warranty or a related product or service. But even smaller hardware and software makers face the same dilemma, and it is the democratization of Windows itself, and the way in which they, too, can reach their users directly, that makes this platform so appealing. If Microsoft required Windows Update, it might favor its big partners over smaller mom & pop-type shops.

But you can’t move forward without taking a step. And I think it’s up to Microsoft to take this step—and the next steps—to realize the Windows Update vision and put control back in users’ hands. The current situation is untenable. And yet it’s something we, as PC users, deal with every single day.