Windows 10 update broke my computer?

From the very beginning of Windows Update (with Windows XP?) until today, I've never had a problem with an update. That's quite a string of luck, wouldn't you say? Or perhaps it's not luck.

Which is wonderful, but doesn't really address the issue of MS sending out updates that haven't been checked to be fit for purpose. My then new laptop in october 2017 ran flawlessly until the following april, when the update issued reduced it to a paperweight. I was fortunate in being able to reinstall win10, but some have had computers destroyed .

I've done clean installs every time I've upgraded...

We are not talking about an upgrade.. we are talking about 'updates' that we have no power of preventing that f**k up our system and require a format and reinstall OS.  Totally different things.

I've done clean installs every time I've upgraded my computer. My first clean install was Windows 98SE, from Windows 95. Later, I did a clean install of Windows 8, from Windows 7; then Windows 8.1 from Windows 8; and finally Windows 10 from Windows 8.1.

In each case, I booted the computer from a CD (in the early days) and later from a USB flash drive that had the Windows installer. In each, the clean install was flawless the first time.

There's no magic to getting this done, and you don't have to be a geek, either. Which is a good thing, because I'm no geek.

The key to my success, in each case, was careful planning. I spent many hours over several weeks learning everything I could about how a clean install is done, and picked up a lot of good practical advice along the way. I prepared a complete, step-by-step battle plan, and I made sure that I had all necessary software already available before I started.

When the time came to do the deed, there were no surprises and everything went according to plan. I'm very glad that I invested all that time in research and preparation, because a top quality install is essential to the correct operation of a computer. I am very certain that the time I spent has more than been repaid by having a computer that runs well and without problems.

Regardless of which operating system we're talking about, a clean install, correctly performed, on supported hardware is as close as you can get to a sure thing with a computer. And once you're all done, the next thing to do is to make an image backup of your hard drive, so you'll never have to reinstall Windows ever again, unless you really want to.

I know your frustration for sure. I've done a clean install a couple of times. I had to run out and buy a flash drive in order to accomplish this. After much effort, I got it working for a few days the first time. The second time it lasted about a day and a half.  It worked so good, that I made sure to "create a restore point". That same night, my mouse started flashing and acting weird so I did a troubleshoot. I assumed it needed an updated driver since I did the clean install.  I was instructed to reboot. Oh boy, I knew that would be a problem and it was.  Rebooting my computer has always caused me trouble, from the day I updated to Windows 10. I've had the blue screen of death on my computer many times over. All it took was a Patch Tuesday.  I tried to roll back to my restore point, well...it timed out and failed. Anyway, the laptop's hard drive is damaged now. I've had to shut down the computer hundreds of times, and finally the hard drive went. It was perfectly fine until the February 2019 update. I'm currently shopping for a new laptop, but I think it's the wrong time of year so I'll just have to wait a bit for a sale. Ok, that's the story on my home laptop. Now for the story at the office...I have come in twice this year to find my printer settings removed. (We're using Windows 7 there.) I would go to print and the IP address had been wiped out. I had to have a professional IT guy assign an IP address. The first time he uninstalled some files from the update or something. What he did to get them operating again was way above my pay grade. Microsoft should be held accountable for these problems and should be held responsible for the cost to fix them. There's something wrong with this whole picture. I haven't been this angry with Microsoft since they forced us out of XP. That was one of the most unfair things that a company could do, especially to small businesses and individuals.