Well they are a small unnecessary evil...i am afraid but the NET is a wild wild world...so you nee some time of protection
earlier this year I discovered in the Windows Task Manager/Performance that my desktop CPU Usage was running at - without any programs open - a constant 50% or more, and the 4 GB of Memory Usage up above 3 GB. Don't recall now if I was experiencing a delay or slowdown anywhere . . . After googling: 'cpu usage 50 nothing running windows 7' found this: https://www.google.ca/?gws_rd=cr&ei...ff+windows+update+windows+7&spf=1497374435392 and my comment after turning the updating off - " * * * * * turned off 10:30 am Tue Jun 13/17 - - so far so good - excellant , CPU Usage 0% with spikes up to 20% or so, Memory a constant 1.08 GB, max 2 GB." currently with NT 7 up with 3 charts and ET open: CPU Usage, constant 0% plus intermittant spikes - email notification spike to 65% then 0% Memory is a constant 1.65 GB. Once upon a time I used an old, Really old Seagate firewall ? program with which I could block any and every Incoming or Outgoing call from accessing the Internet. The 'block' didn't shut down the whole program unless I wanted it to, but rather what was usually an 'Update'. Worst of the updaters at those times were the antivirus programs. The free Avast av makes some comment on how they use the info they collect - - - 'info they collect' ? ? ?, wtf. So I'm Very anti updating especially when I've no idea what data the particular company - Especially Microsoft is collecting, what they're doing with it, and how they may be profiting from it. Google of course is constantly collecting data from us as well as all the sites we visit, but I don't believe - correct me if I'm wrong - they can collect 'internal' computer data, the way I believe MS can, could. Without a detailed and specific understanding - being provided to me - of what any particular update is and it's purpose, I see no reason to 'update'.
I also hate Windows Update with a passion. First I had a PC completely corrupted after a Windows Update. Second, one of my PCs downloads a lot of data overnight, and Windows Update has a habit of rebooting the PC in the middle of the night and killing my downloads. It wasn't so bad under Windows 7 when it was very easy to disable automatic updates, but Windows 10 makes it extremely difficult to disable auto updates. And even after going through these hoops in Windows 10, after every major update, Windows undoes these changes and auto update is back on. It is simply amazing how much more maintenance Windows requires vs my Linux and Chromebook devices.