Windows Update in Windows Vista is wrapped in a regular window in the operating system itself rather than being opened as a web page in Internet Explorer 7. The basics are the same and it is the same underlying components in both Windows Vista and when you run Windows Update in a browser window on for instance Windows XP. Never mind, on a Vista client computer set to connect to a WSUS (Windows Server Update Services) server it will of course always check for updates there. In the Windows Update control panel on a client computer you can however choose to alternatively search for updates on Windows Update. If you deploy other software such as Office 2007 you might want to use Microsoft Update instead of Windows Update, to see if there are other updates available for Office and other Microsoft products, not only Windows.
The reason why I want to check Microsoft Update manually from time to time us is to regularly check which updates arrive to the various client computers that can be downloaded separately and then integrated into our installation media. Since opting into Microsoft Update require administrative rights on the computers I want to set Microsoft Update somehow automatically and apparently there are still no GPO settings for this, which I find rather strange. After doing some reserach I have found the solution to automatically set that Microsoft Update will be the default instead of Windows Update. The script to add is as follows:
Set ServiceManager = CreateObject(“Microsoft.Update.ServiceManager”)
ServiceManager.ClientApplicationID = “My App”
‘add the Microsoft Update Service, GUID
Set NewUpdateService = ServiceManager.AddService2(“7971f918-a847-4430-9279-4a52d1efe18d”,7,””)
Add this to a startup or login script to make sure Microsoft Update is always default.