How to Configure Essentials to Automatically Select and Approve Updates

Applies To: System Center Essentials 2010

In this release of System Center Essentials 2010, we recommend that you let Essentials automatically select the updates to be downloaded when synchronizing with Microsoft Update. Essentials regularly scans the environment to ensure that only relevant update packages are downloaded. Use the Update Management Configuration wizard to configure Essentials to automatically select updates when synchronizing with Microsoft Update. As a result, overall performance of Essentials improves, you have to review fewer packages for deployment, and you only see the available updates relevant to your IT environment.

To configure Essentials to select updates automatically

1. In the Essentials console, click the Updates navigation button, and then, in the Tasks pane, click Configure Microsoft Update Settings.

2. When the Introduction page of the Update Management Configuration wizard appears, click Next to begin. Select the Do not show this page again box if you want to skip the introduction the next time you start the wizard.

   Tip

   You can change Update management settings by clicking the Administration button in the Essentials console and clicking Configure update management settings under Microsoft Updates in the Administration Overview pane.

3. On the Proxy Server page, if you do not use a proxy server to connect to the Internet, leave the setting at No, and then click Synchronize. If you do use a proxy server, click Yes, complete the required fields as described in the following section, and then click Synchronize.

   • Server name—Choose between HTTP or HTTPS, and then type the proxy server domain name in the text box.

   • Port number—Type the port number to use for the proxy in the text box.

   Select the check box to specify an account that uses permissions to connect to the proxy server, if required. Type the user name and password in the text boxes, select the domain to which the user account belongs, and then click OK to save and apply the changes.

4. After synchronization is complete, the Products page will be displayed. You will be prompted to decide whether to have Essentials automatically download updates or you can manually specify which updates should be downloaded. To ensure that managed computers stay as secure as possible, we strongly recommend that you keep the default setting to Automatically to enable Essentials to determine the required updates based on scans of your environment. If you decide to manually specify which products to update, click Manually, select one of the options described in the following section, and then click Next.

   • Download updates for Operating Systems only—If you choose this option, Essentials only downloads updates for Windows operating systems.

   • I will choose products from the list below—If you select this option, you will have to select Microsoft products manually from the list for which Essentials should download updates.

5. On the Update Languages page, click Yes to download updates based on the locale of the Essentials server, or click No to select which languages to synchronize, and then click Next.

6. On the Classifications page, click Yes to download only critical, security, and service pack updates from Microsoft, or click No to select the classifications of updates to synchronize, and then click Next.

7. On the Synchronization page, specify the time of day and select the number of synchronizations per day to check for new updates from Microsoft Update, and then click Next.

   Important

   If you chose to automatically download Microsoft updates based on your environment as recommended, the Synchronize manually option will not be available. Synchronization begins 30 minutes after the specified time.

8. On the Summary page, review the configured settings. Select the Synchronize updates when this wizard check box to run synchronization for the first time after the wizard is complete, and then click Finish.

   Note

   First-time synchronization can be very resource-intensive and may take several hours to complete, depending on your configuration settings.

Essentials 2010 uses Group Policy to configure the Windows Update agent to receive updates from the Essentials management server. These settings apply to all computers managed by Essentials unless you create a new Group Policy object (GPO) to customize the update management settings. Instructions on how to create and apply customized Windows Update settings by using a new GPO are in the Update Management section of the Essentials 2010 Operations Guide. The default Windows Update settings that Essentials uses are shown in the following table.

See Also

Tasks

How to Configure Update Management and Scheduled Maintenance in Essentials
How to Configure Synchronization Frequency with Microsoft Update in Essentials
How to Configure Automatic Approvals to Support Deadlines in Essentials
How to Manually Synchronize Updates with Microsoft Update in Essentials
How to Create Custom Update Settings for Client and Server Computers in Essentials