Stop upgrade to Windows 11

I just dealt with a laptop that is unable to run Windows 11 correctly, that had nevertheless upgraded to Windows 11 without the user knowing how.

10 days had passed, so I had to do a fresh install of Windows 10.

But it appears from this thread that there is no straightforward way of stopping it from upgrading to 11 again that a typical user can use, and not even a method for techies that is well publicised by Microsoft.

FWIW I have attempted to block it with this method: https://www.askwoody.com/forums/topic/6000005-registry-keys-and-group-policy-info-to-keep-windows-10-from-going-to-11/ This seems better than the other links that have have been posted, as it doesn't suggest restricting updates to a feature update version.

The problem with the laptop in question is documented here:

https://www.dell.com/support/kbdoc/en-uk/000196864/vostro-5481-and-vostro-5581-do-not-boot-after-upgrading-to-windows-11

There's lots of reports on the web of people being tricked into installing Windows 11 one way or another - e.g. requiring them to press a 'Decline upgrade' button to stay on 10, which makes it seem like they're declining the option to use 11 forever.

Forget these 'guides' or you'll end up missing important updates. If you want to block the Windows 11 upgrade, simply head into your BIOS and disable TPM. Your computer will work fine without it and windows 10 doesn't need it.

I WANT MICROSOFT TO TURN OFF THE CLOCK/TIMER WHICH IS TRYING TO SWITCH MY CPU OS TO WINDOWS 11 HELP.. MIKE

NOTIFY ME WITH A 'HOW' TO STOP THIS "OVERREACH" BY MICROSOFT BY E-MAIL... ******@comcast.net THANKS !!

Reading through this entire thread, looks like thst MS has outdone themselves again. I expect no less these days.

Back in the Win 7 days there was a utility to run to kill off any auto update to Windows 10. We need something similiar - if it is at all possible; but according to this thread there ain't.

Please build a time machine and let us all go back to the days of 2001-2002 when XP was "heck yeah" fun.

Is there any alternative to updates being disabled altogether, switching back to Manual updates, as mentioned by several others in this string?

I'm unable to upgrade to Win11 even if I wanted to because of insufficient space on our C drive. I confirmed this yesterday with Microsoft. I want to be able to do Win10 updates as long as they're available without Win11 trying to install (as our system keeps trying to force us to do.) I've only got 20 Gb of free space, not the 64 Gb that's required, and I've moved everything possible from the drive, whose total size is only 118 Gb.

I've got a timed block on updates now, set to the latest possible date but I don't like operating without getting security updates. I also don't know what to expect when Microsoft stop supporting Win 10 altogether. Is my PC at serious risk when that happens?