Windows update often notifies me of updates for Flash for IE10, and IE10 updates, and Office components I don't have installed, and Windows Defender, and other programs I either don't use or haven't installed. Is it safe to hide these updates? Or in the case of IE10 and Defender for example would it be better to let the "important" updates install? Thanks
update what is installed on your PC like IE 10, updates fix some security vulnerabilities and incompatibilities issues so it it is recommended . The rest you can hide.
U should install every important update available to make sure your PC is 100% safe & secure cause skipping important updates might make your system vulnerable to some form of attack.....u can skip the optional updates though
@Carlos: And so it is! Seems IE10 isn't such a dinosaur; how times have changed. Thanks for the heads up. It's odd that I had Flash player on my system separately, when both IE10 and Chrome come with in-browser Flash plugins. Is that normal do you know? @Windows user: Turns out after I install the Flash updates the only "important" updates remaining are for Office components I haven't installed, actually!
There are two different Flash installers - one for IE's ActiveX (name ends in _ax) and the second one is the plugin (NPAPI) for the other browsers (except Chrome). On Windows 8 you still must install the latter if you need it in non-IE/Chrome browsers, but the ActiveX installer throws an error since that is the one built into IE10.
I think that windows just likes to hide features that you uncheck. If you want to fully remove the feature, I think you may need to use some sort of boot winpe or pre-integrate the removal. If windows doesn't fully remove anything, it makes sense that it will keep trying to patch it.