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Why does "never check for updates" fail?

pcGnome
pcGnome
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This is possibly just a short term problem. However, I installed 29, was horrified that I cannot have my precious status bar and reverted to 28 (system restore for Win7Ult & install 28 over 29 in XP). The first thing I did after was to check help-about to verify I'm truly running 28 and then I went to tools-options-advanced-update and selected "never check for updates". Ten minutes later up pops the "new security update available ... 29" and it doesn't allow for "I don't want this", it only had "update" & "remind me later" which is as arrogant and obtuse as all get out. This only happened on my XP machine, not my Win7Ult. Is this one of those "must restart" to work? It doesn't say so. I just want no thought of updates until I see the status bar is returned to its rightful place. Don't want to be constantly annoyed because they are shoving 29 down my throat. Any ideas?...pcG.(((p.s. thinking this constant updating of everything is a big scam to keep people employed - MPC media player classic is a finished product and hasn't NEEDED an update in about a decade - what if three times a week the factory sent out someone to "update" your car or sewing machine. This trend really needs to slow down - get those programmers REAL jobs, not makework.)))

This is possibly just a short term problem. However, I installed 29, was horrified that I cannot have my precious status bar and reverted to 28 (system restore for Win7Ult & install 28 over 29 in XP). The first thing I did after was to check help-about to verify I'm truly running 28 and then I went to tools-options-advanced-update and selected "never check for updates". Ten minutes later up pops the "new security update available ... 29" and it doesn't allow for "I don't want this", it only had "update" & "remind me later" which is as arrogant and obtuse as all get out. This only happened on my XP machine, not my Win7Ult. Is this one of those "must restart" to work? It doesn't say so. I just want no thought of updates until I see the status bar is returned to its rightful place. Don't want to be constantly annoyed because they are shoving 29 down my throat. Any ideas?...pcG.(((p.s. thinking this constant updating of everything is a big scam to keep people employed - MPC media player classic is a finished product and hasn't NEEDED an update in about a decade - what if three times a week the factory sent out someone to "update" your car or sewing machine. This trend really needs to slow down - get those programmers REAL jobs, not makework.)))

Chosen solution

Hi,

I'm unaware on why the Never Check for Updates option doesn't work, but you're not alone.

You can set these prefs in about:config to disable automatic updating:
app.update.auto - false
app.update.enabled - false
app.update.silent - false

Read this answer in context 👍 3

All Replies (3)

Moses
Moses
  • Moderator
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Chosen Solution

Hi,

I'm unaware on why the Never Check for Updates option doesn't work, but you're not alone.

You can set these prefs in about:config to disable automatic updating:
app.update.auto - false
app.update.enabled - false
app.update.silent - false

pcGnome
pcGnome Question owner
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Moses - thank you very much. As I entered each one, they do say "false", so there must be something in XP where things like this fail once and then work (the balloon popup has not returned). Still nice to have the nuts and bolts way to stop this stuff, always. . pcG

dandelion777
dandelion777
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This problem seems to extend to version 29, which I use and i'm running Windows 7.Don't want to upgrade to 30 or 31 as my KIS secure banking add on is incompatible. Like others, choosing the never check for downloads option doesn't work. Every third or fourth time I open Firefox it automatically upgrades me. Very annoying. Only way I found of stopping automatic updates was to choose the notify me but don't download. That means you have to close the update box every time you open the browser, which is very annoying. Thanks for posting the correct aboutconfig settings. Hopefully this will work on version 29 for me too

Modified by dandelion777