updates

[13048728]

How large are the new updates to windows 10 and what do they do for the everyday user?

[Norphy]

Are you talking about the monthly cumulative updates, or are you talking about feature updates?

 

The monthly updates are usually in the region of 500-700MB. They're generally either bug fixes, security updates, updates to the servicing stack or a combination of both. They fix (and sometimes introduce!) problems that your users may be having. See the recent Print Nightmare issues for a recent high profile example. There's also one other possibility, which I'll cover in the next paragraph.

 

A Feature Update is where Windows updated to a new build, e.g. going from 1909 to 21H1. With these, you get new features or the existing features get updated, fixed or removed. The size of these is entirely dependant on which version you're upgrading from to the version that you're upgrading to. With recent versions of Windows, the extra code that's required to go from one build of Windows is actually included in a monthly cumulative update but it lays dormant. You can then use what Microsoft call an Enablement Update to activate this dormant code; these Enablement Updates are usually only a few hundred KB. Going from build 1903 to 1909 could be done with an enablement update as long as you have the cumulative update which includes the new version installed, as can going from 2004 to 20H2, 21H1 and 21H2. However, if you're going from (say) 1709 to 21H2 you need a full feature update, which is essentially a Windows ISO wrapped in a WIM file, which will be around 4GB.

Edited January 6, 2022 by Norphy

[elsiegee40]

How large are the new updates to windows 10 and what do they do for the everyday user?

 

Is this a homework question by any chance? It would help us pitch our answers

Edited January 6, 2022 by elsiegee40

[DalekSec]

what do they do for the everyday user?

 

Cause bluescreens and new zero days

 

Teacher : Well, they're not wrong!