I have been an ardent supporter of Microsoft. I fought with people who supported Apple.
But now "My experience forces me to believe it is Microsoft policy towards windows updates". I clean reinstall windows 7 home premium on my new hard drive. I started Windows update right after clean install. For hours no available updates appeared. I got tired and left the computer alone. Around midnight I checked again same thing no success. It was still checking for updates. Finally I went to bed leaving computer running. Next morning I checked 200+ updates were available and I downloaded and installed them successfully. I GAVE THIS ADVICE TO FEW FRIENDS, and They ALL HAD THE SAME EXPERIENCE
I am seriously thinking to leave Microsoft and go to apple