Vista restarts computer automatically

[Carney]

This is about Vista Home Premium: I will be working in any ap (Word, Photoshop, any MS or other AP) and suddenly the computer begins to shutdown and load updates and/or system security aps. This happened again today in the middle of a presentation and I could not get the system to reboot without going through almost 30 mins of updating and changes. There is no warning, no notice and this occurs regardless of what is running. This is making me crazy! I'll be in the middle of working and - bang! - the system starts shutting down and there is nothing I can do to interupt this process. Can someone, please, tell me how to end this issue? I'm fairly sure there must be someway to configure Vista not to do auto-updates and/or system changes, but I can't figure out how. Thanks for any help anyone can offer.

System Specs:
Dell Inspiron 2 Duo CPU @ 2.5 Ghz
4 GB RAM
Vista Home Premium SP 1

[ale52]

I'm not too Vista savvy but I would believe that in Control Panel you would find an "Automatic Updates" icon there and when once opened you'd have different options on how to handle AU.

Alan <>< 

[Carney]

Thanks Alan - I have already configured updates for a time when the computer is not in use, but connected to the Internet. It does download and install those updates; however, it seems to also install some updates at other times despite my having set the time differently. This is a new issue and occured for the first time last week and again today. Of-course, today I was doing a presentation for a client when this happened! Not being able to override the update installation and reboot my system so I could continue the presentation was a real mess and left me feeling pretty unprofessional in front of my client. It took over 10 minutes for the system to do its thing before I could use the computer again. I have XP on my desktop, but my new laptop has Vista. All things considered, I very much prefer XP.

[DaveLembke]

I too hate Vista, and am sticking with XP, but I would set updates to Manual even for the download process to avoid bandwidth and CPU consumption during presentations. This must have been rather embarrassing to have happen in the middle of an important presentation. Hopefully setting updates to manual will fix this.

[soybean]

This is about Vista Home Premium: I will be working in any ap (Word, Photoshop, any MS or other AP) and suddenly the computer begins to shutdown and load updates and/or system security aps. This happened again today in the middle of a presentation and I could not get the system to reboot without going through almost 30 mins of updating and changes. There is no warning, no notice and this occurs regardless of what is running. This is making me crazy! I'll be in the middle of working and - bang! - the system starts shutting down and there is nothing I can do to interupt this process. Can someone, please, tell me how to end this issue? I'm fairly sure there must be someway to configure Vista not to do auto-updates and/or system changes, but I can't figure out how. Thanks for any help anyone can offer.

This all sounds rather strange. I've had my notebook PC with Vista Home Premium since July 2007 and it does alert when updates are waiting and allow me to decide whether to proceed then or wait. 

I suspect you just need to change a setting.  Open your Windows Updates panel, where you should see a link on the left side named "Change settings".  Select it.  You can entirely disable automatic updates there but I would advise against that.  Under "Install updates automatically (recommended)", you have an option to "Check for updates but let me choose whether to dowload and install them".  Select that option and close the panel.  That should prevent such undesired behavior from happening.

[mickster9]

I have vista and i have it set to prompt me before downloading so i can choose when and if to install updates.

Anyway after they have downloaded and installed i get a box in the bottom right asking to restart now. But you can also choose to postpone for 10mins, 1 hour or 4hours before it prompts you again.

[mroilfield]

Have you ran any virus scans?

[Carney]

Thank you for all the help, folks! I really am puzzled about this situation. I have (several times) set updates to manual and prior to this there was no issue. I went back and checked the configuration of the update/install updates and it is still set to manual. I even reset everything again, just to ensure I had not missed something the first time. I have Norton running active with all relevent updates and have run a manual scan with no results. I also ran SpyBot in case something came through Norton and did not find any issues. Basically, I have done most of what you suggested (good, reasonable suggestions, BTW) and the issue still comes up. In fact, this morning I powered up the laptop and let it sit idle for about an hour. During this time it again tried to run update/install - however, it was not connected to the Internet so it stopped. Its times like this when I wish I worked for a company with an IT dept! But, I'm a writer/photographer and work for myself - very much not an IT guru! Thanks again for the help.

[patio]

Is every shutdown happening with an update or does it just seem that way ? ?
Have you considered it may be hardware and not Vista ? ?

[Broni]

Are you 100% sure, those are Windows updates?
Windows updates usually come once a month, on 1st Tuesday.

[patio]

I'll bet they are HP printer updates...for a Beer Broni ? ?

[Broni]

You bet

[Carney]

Well, the updates read as OS updates; however, I’m noticing (now that I’m more aware) they do not resemble typical updates. Instead they look like system diagnostics and/or major repair utility processes. I wish I could replicate the “updates” and the notices that appear because then I would cut/paste them here so you folks might better understand what happens. They are definitely not updates to a printer, scanner or other external device since the laptop has none installed. I use a USB cable to transfer files between the laptop and the desktop and do backups on an external HD that does not use an installed driver.

As to whether this could be a hardware issue, that thought has crossed my mind. This is a fairly new laptop, but, nothing is perfect and I certainly have had my share of hardware issues from Dell in the past. The good news is that later this week I have a client meeting with someone who has a good IT person on staff. Since we are long term collogues I have no qualms asking for help. It is very possible he will be able to diagnose the issue. Thank you to everyone for your help, advice and suggestions.

[Broni]

Post couple of screenshots of those "updates".

[nalee]

Set up the time its scheduled to update.