windows update notification icon

Hello All - This is my first post to this forum - please forgive any protocol errors.

My problem is that when Windows Updates are available, the notification icon does not appear in either the notification area or the overflow area. All I see is an exclamation point by the shutdown tab that tells me updates have been downloaded and are ready to be installed.

In the notification overflow area, if I click on customize, I can sometimes see the icon there with a gray description "downloading x% complete. It's never at 100%, and it doesn't change, even after many hours. Sometimes the gray description is there without any icon above or to the left of it.

I've read about the notification icon area reset, but that appears to flush out obsolete icons, I do not know if it is still applicable to my issue. Just to clarify again, the Windows Update Icon "may be visible" when I click on "Customize", but it is never visible in the notification area or the overflow area. I also have it set to show icon and notification.

I've tried to attach a screenshot to give some example.

Any help will be much appreciated.

Thank you.

Control Panel\System and Security\Windows Update\Change settings and select "Check for updates but let me choose whether to download and install them" :)

Thank you Cata - I've just done that, but I'm not sure it's getting me to my desired result.

Yes, once I did what you suggested, the Windows Update immediately showed up in the Notification area. When I hover over it, it tells me "New Updates Are Available".

I viewed them and saw the only important update is the SP1 - which I'm somewhat reluctant to do at this point - considering some of the negative comments I've read about it on this forum.

Now the issue is, will that Icon always remain there. If so, then I'd have to periodically check to see if "newer" updates are available. I don't know if changing the display option from "Show Icon and Notifications" to "Only show notifications" would be the answer.

Basically, I'm looking for things to work like they do on my older XP SP3 computer. I'd like to "see" the icon only when new updates are available - and not be caught by surprise when I go to shutdown my PC.

Will "hiding" that update do the trick? Then perhaps the icon will only show up when "newer" updates are available, instead of staying there all the time.

Please let me know what you think - and thank you for your help. It is much appreciated.

MrBear said:

Will "hiding" that update do the trick? Then perhaps the icon will only show up when "newer" updates are available, instead of staying there all the time.

Correct

Worked like a charm! Strange that the "automatically download" option seems to create the issue - a Windows 7 quirk?

Thank you again.

You are welcome! :)

I have the same issue as of recently, don't know why it disappeared. But I already have it on the "check for updates but let me choose whether to download and install them" option from the start. Haven't installed any updates for a month, but the icon disappeared a week ago.