How to Use Windows Update
Like any large software company, Microsoft continually fixes problems and security vulnerabilities in its products. In order to distribute these improvements to the relevant computers around the world, it uses a service known as Windows Update. When Windows Update runs it checks the configuration of your computer (versions of software etc.), checks with Microsoft for the latest updates for your particular configuration, and then downloads and installs them so that your system is always up to date.
There are actually two closely-related parts to this functionality – Windows Update which controls distribution and installation of update to Windows, and Microsoft Update which performs the same function for other Microsoft products.
Your computer was probably set up with Windows Update enabled by default, but it's worth checking this to be sure. If you select "Windows Update" from the Start menu -> All Programs, then you'll see the following:
In this case, it says everything is up to date, which is what you want. It also tells you the last time that it checked for and installed updates, that it's set to automatically install any new updates at 3:00 every day, and finally that it's set to install updates to other Microsoft products as well as to Windows itself. This is exactly what you want to see (everything is in order, and future updates will be automatically installed without me having to do anything), so in this case you wouldn't need to do anything more.
If your computer wasn't already set to do everything automatically though, then you can click on "Change settings" on the left-hand side of the window.
As you can see, this allows you to change the settings associated with Windows Update. You can control the way that updates are downloaded and installed (automatically, which is the recommended option, or manually). If you choose to have the updates automatically installed, you can also control the frequency and timing of the installation.
The other options let you control whether to install recommended options. When they create an update, Microsoft determine how important they feel it is. In Vista, there are three priority levels: Important, Recommended and Optional, which are pretty self-explanatory. If checked (which we recommend), this field means that Recommended updates will be automatically installed in addition to Important ones. Optional updates cannot be downloaded and installed automatically by Windows Update.
Finally, if you check the last box, then updates to other Microsoft products which are present on your computer will also be downloaded and installed (this is the Microsoft Update functionality). Again, we recommend that you select this option.
If you want to install optional updates, click on "Check for updates" on the left-hand side of the main Windows Update window. If there are any available, you can then click on "View available updates", select the ones that you want, and then click "Install".
You can view the updates that have been installed on your computer by clicking on "View update history" on the left-hand side of the main Windows Update screen. This displays a list of the updates that have been installed.
If you want to remove an update (perhaps because you're investigating a problem which only started occurring after the update was applied), you can click on the "Installed Updates" link near the top of this window, which brings up another window in which you can select and uninstall individual updates.
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