As Windows 7 continues to wind down its lifecycle, Microsoft is pushing the many holdouts to update to Windows 10. For enterprise users, the company is seeking to make updates easier. Microsoft says Win10 feature updates will now be smaller and easier to download.
Feature upgrades are the twice-yearly releases of Windows 10, such as this year’s April 2018 Update and the upcoming October 2018 Update. These are the builds that add new features and abilities to the platform.
As these are overhaul updates, the files can be quite weighty. For example, most run at just under 5GB. This is because Microsoft bundles x64 and x86 together within a single download. For companies, this can be a problem for companies, who often must update multiple machines simultaneously.
Microsoft is now taking steps to make these downloads more management for organizations. The company says x64 packages will now be sent out individually, so customers will have a download file of just 2.6GB.
“Customers who still need x86 feature updates will need to use the combined files originally published, which will continue to be available and do not have the ‘x64’ distinction,” explained Joel Frauenheim of Microsoft.
“Configuration Manager or other enterprise management solutions can pull the x86 files from that feature update download to deploy as they did before.”
Across Versions
By splitting x64, Microsoft is ensuring a slimmer package. This lesser file size is available for Windows 10 versions 1703, 1709, and 1803. So, users updating from an older version to any of those releases will now have a smoother experience. The same goes for Windows 10 version 1809, which will launch next month as the October 2018 Update.
