:-) You have to read the sentence literally.  It may have updated faster but I don't know because I started the update and walked away.  I came back 10 minutes later and it was done.

I'm doing everything that you suggested in your post.  That will be my new update procedure for my Vista machine.

The .msu file finished in less than 10 minutes.

Ten minutes still sounds a bit excessive.   I typically see the .msu installer finish in about a minute - the system restart to finish the installation is usually the slowest part of the process.  If your .msu installer appears to hang on "Checking for updates..." that usually means that you have a Windows Update session trying to run to completion in the background that needs to be stopped. 

You can usually avoid this problem by following STEP # 1 of the instructions posted 16-Jun-2016 in m#1's thread Updates not working, it has been searching for updates for hours before running your .msu installer.  If you disable your automatic Windows Updates [Windows Update | Change settings | Important updates | Never check for updates (not recommended)] and re-boot (the re-boot is important) this should terminate any background Windows Update sessions, but if your .msu installer still gets stuck at "Checking for updates..."  there are a few additional hints in post # 3 of E-Chen's thread *Vista Updates just keeps "Checking"* in the bleepingcomputer forum.

I've gone one step further and have permanently disabled automatic Windows Updates [(Never check for updates (not recommended)] on my Vista machine.  I wait a day or two after each Patch Tuesday (the second Tuesday of the month), check Dalai's webpage at http://wu.krelay.de/en/, and download and install the standalone update package (.msu file) for the latest Win32K.sys update added to his list of required updates.  Once the new Win32K.sys update is installed my manual Windows Updates always run "normally" (i.e., "Checking for updates..." finishes in about 20 min and not several hours) and my remaining Patch Tuesday updates install successfully.

32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox v49.0 * NIS v22.7.1.32 * MBAM Premium v2.2.1

Thanks for the tip. Yes, I was using IE9.  Downloading with Firefox worked.  Whenever I browse Microsoft websites, I try to use Microsoft browsers since I would expect the combination would give me the best experience.  Silly me.

The .msu file finished in less than 10 minutes.

For September, according to Dalai's page, KB3185911 replaces KB3177725 as the update needed to be manually installed.  Unfortunately, it appears that MS has removed the update from their servers.  You can still find the webpage describing the update.  But when you press the Download button, nothing happens.

Hi mbulger:

Are you using Internet Explorer (IE9) as your browser?

After seeing similar reports from other Vista SP2 users I can confirm that I had no problem downloading the installers using Firefox v49 but was redirected to the "Thank you for downloading" message using IE9 without ever seeing a pop-up asking me to Run/Save the .msu installer.  See my post # 103 in KellyB56's thread *Windows Vista Update Hangs at "Checking For Updates*" in the bleepingcomputer forum (under the username lmacri).  Other users in that thread confirmed that the download also worked with Chrome but not with IE9.

Here are the direct links to the installers for KB3185911 on the Microsoft Download Center, assuming this is the only Win32K.sys update on Dalai's list that is currently missing from your computer.  Let me know if the direct link works for you.

     32-bit (x86) Vista SP2: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=53714

     64-bit (x64) Vista SP2: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=53697

If you don't have another browser besides IE9 (or don't have access to another computer you can use to download the .msu installer to a USB stick and then transfer the file to your Vista desktop) and the direct link doesn't work, see my suggestions in post

39 of magicshaw's thread *Help Update Problems....* in the bleepingcomputer forum to flush your DNS cache and/or clear your IE9 browsing history.

32-bit Vista Home Premium SP2 * Firefox v49.0 * NIS v22.7.1.32 * MBAM Premium v2.2.1

For September, according to Dalai's page, KB3185911 replaces KB3177725 as the update needed to be manually installed.  Unfortunately, it appears that MS has removed the update from their servers.  You can still find the webpage describing the update.  But when you press the Download button, nothing happens.

I've had to go back to running Windows Update on my Vista system and it has been going for 24 hours now.