IT Faces More Hurdles with Win 10 Anniversary

Rex McMillan

Win 10 is now in official anniversary mode with its 1607 anniversary update ready to roll out to some 400 million devices. Microsoft is optimistic users will covet this update and offers suggestions on how you can fast track your update if so desired. While users may find the anniversary update features such as improved taskbar management helpful, IT pros will continue to grapple with the new way Microsoft is executing updates: these feature updates were previously called branch upgrades and quality updates, the latter also known as cumulative patches.

Feature updates' impact lies between a service pack and an operating system upgrade. They can be as large as 4GB and will typically occur every six months. They contain a combination of new features and fixes, and will cause an upgrade impact to the end user. These feature updates are going to have a much bigger impact on your network and local storage than the old service packs. They are bigger, going to be released more frequently, and will have a higher user impact during upgrades.

To add to the complexity, Win 10 is executing a number of types of servicing branches.


Even further, Microsoft has announced Win 10 Ver. 1607 is initially considered the Current Branch (CB) and will become Current Branch for Business (CBB) in four to six months.

If you're an IT pro charged with optimizing the performance of your enterprise, what do branches mean for you? Here are a few things to consider:

■ Choose Stability: Enterprises that must have minimal service disruptions, such as health care, may want to opt for the Long Term Servicing Branch, with updates every two to three years and a long support lifetime.

■ Test the Waters: IT can choose to deploy a more frequently changing branch on a subset of computers, the early adopters. This gives IT a type of beta trial, if you will, to identify potential application compatibility issues that could adversely affect performance.

■ Standardization: For your organization you may find that one branch will work for most machines.

■ Mitigate Risk: Some of the branches are supported for only months so where does this leave your network security? It means IT will have more work to do in making sure it deploys feature updates as they become available, since like it or not, Win 10 feature updates are frequent and support has an end date.

Upgrade Model

We've discussed how to parse out these branches, but let us emphasize that these branch updates are going to be constantly rolling out, and will often overlap.

Here is a four step approach that can be applied to different rollout plans:

■ Preview Insider Branch: Insider branch should be installed and used to preview features, perform early testing and prepare for the release of current branch. Due to release cadence, it will pay large dividends to use early branches to find and resolve issues. This enables IT to prepare for the release and piloting of CB and have time to mitigate potential issues.

■ Pilot on Current Branch: As branches are progressive in nature, rollouts should schedule the pilot phase to commence with the release of Current Branch. Current Branch will stabilize over time so pilot systems can detect issues that may affect production systems. This branch should be used for application compatibility testing. Leveraging CB enables the organization to test applications and be prepared to migrate to the branch when it is slated as CCB (Current Branch for Business).

■ Production on Current Branch for Business: When the branch is declared Current Branch for Business, it should be very stable and the pilot rollouts should have already identified branch compatibility issues that can be addressed before this phase begins. Production systems should be run on CCB.

■ Grace Period for Problem Upgrades: Enterprises should be done with upgrades before hitting the grace period and use this time to address problem upgrades only.

IT needs to evaluate the performance impact of these various branches, in terms of frequency, support limitations and security risks and have a plan in place to avoid disruption as these Win 10 updates start hitting your enterprise.

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IT Faces More Hurdles with Win 10 Anniversary

Rex McMillan

Win 10 is now in official anniversary mode with its 1607 anniversary update ready to roll out to some 400 million devices. Microsoft is optimistic users will covet this update and offers suggestions on how you can fast track your update if so desired. While users may find the anniversary update features such as improved taskbar management helpful, IT pros will continue to grapple with the new way Microsoft is executing updates: these feature updates were previously called branch upgrades and quality updates, the latter also known as cumulative patches.

Feature updates' impact lies between a service pack and an operating system upgrade. They can be as large as 4GB and will typically occur every six months. They contain a combination of new features and fixes, and will cause an upgrade impact to the end user. These feature updates are going to have a much bigger impact on your network and local storage than the old service packs. They are bigger, going to be released more frequently, and will have a higher user impact during upgrades.

To add to the complexity, Win 10 is executing a number of types of servicing branches.


Even further, Microsoft has announced Win 10 Ver. 1607 is initially considered the Current Branch (CB) and will become Current Branch for Business (CBB) in four to six months.

If you're an IT pro charged with optimizing the performance of your enterprise, what do branches mean for you? Here are a few things to consider:

■ Choose Stability: Enterprises that must have minimal service disruptions, such as health care, may want to opt for the Long Term Servicing Branch, with updates every two to three years and a long support lifetime.

■ Test the Waters: IT can choose to deploy a more frequently changing branch on a subset of computers, the early adopters. This gives IT a type of beta trial, if you will, to identify potential application compatibility issues that could adversely affect performance.

■ Standardization: For your organization you may find that one branch will work for most machines.

■ Mitigate Risk: Some of the branches are supported for only months so where does this leave your network security? It means IT will have more work to do in making sure it deploys feature updates as they become available, since like it or not, Win 10 feature updates are frequent and support has an end date.

Upgrade Model

We've discussed how to parse out these branches, but let us emphasize that these branch updates are going to be constantly rolling out, and will often overlap.

Here is a four step approach that can be applied to different rollout plans:

■ Preview Insider Branch: Insider branch should be installed and used to preview features, perform early testing and prepare for the release of current branch. Due to release cadence, it will pay large dividends to use early branches to find and resolve issues. This enables IT to prepare for the release and piloting of CB and have time to mitigate potential issues.

■ Pilot on Current Branch: As branches are progressive in nature, rollouts should schedule the pilot phase to commence with the release of Current Branch. Current Branch will stabilize over time so pilot systems can detect issues that may affect production systems. This branch should be used for application compatibility testing. Leveraging CB enables the organization to test applications and be prepared to migrate to the branch when it is slated as CCB (Current Branch for Business).

■ Production on Current Branch for Business: When the branch is declared Current Branch for Business, it should be very stable and the pilot rollouts should have already identified branch compatibility issues that can be addressed before this phase begins. Production systems should be run on CCB.

■ Grace Period for Problem Upgrades: Enterprises should be done with upgrades before hitting the grace period and use this time to address problem upgrades only.

IT needs to evaluate the performance impact of these various branches, in terms of frequency, support limitations and security risks and have a plan in place to avoid disruption as these Win 10 updates start hitting your enterprise.

Related Links

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Escaping Pilot Purgatory: How AI Becomes an Operational Advantage

In live financial environments, capital markets software cannot pause for rebuilds. New capabilities are introduced as stacked technology layers to meet evolving demands while systems remain active, data keeps moving, and controls stay intact. AI is no exception, and its opportunities are significant: accelerated decision cycles, compressed manual workflows, and more effective operations across complex environments. The constraint isn't the models themselves, but the architectural environments they enter ...

Closing the Gap in Modern Tech and the Tools Meant to Monitor Them

Like most digital transformation shifts, organizations often prioritize productivity and leave security and observability to keep pace. This usually translates to both the mass implementation of new technology and fragmented monitoring and observability (M&O) tooling. In the era of AI and varied cloud architecture, a disparate observability function can be dangerous. IT teams will lack a complete picture of their IT environment, making it harder to diagnose issues while slowing down mean time to resolve (MTTR). In fact, according to recent data from the SolarWinds State of Monitoring & Observability Report, 77% of IT personnel said the lack of visibility across their on-prem and cloud architecture was an issue ...

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Technology management is evolving, and in turn, so is the scope of FinOps. The FinOps Foundation recently updated their mission statement from "advancing the people who manage the value of cloud" to "advancing the people who manage the value of technology." This seemingly small change solidifies a larger evolution: FinOps practitioners have organically expanded to be focused on more than just cloud cost optimization. Today, FinOps teams are largely — and quickly — expanding their job descriptions, evolving into a critical function for managing the full value of technology ...

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Enterprises are under pressure to scale AI quickly. Yet despite considerable investment, adoption continues to stall. One of the most overlooked reasons is vendor sprawl ... In reality, no organization deliberately sets out to create sprawling vendor ecosystems. More often, complexity accumulates over time through well-intentioned initiatives, such as enterprise-wide digital transformation efforts, point solutions, or decentralized sourcing strategies ...

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In the modern enterprise, the conversation around AI has moved past skepticism toward a stage of active adoption. According to our 2026 State of IT Trends Report: The Human Side of Autonomous AI, nearly 90% of IT professionals view AI as a net positive, and this optimism is well-founded. We are seeing agentic AI move beyond simple automation to actively streamlining complex data insights and eliminating the manual toil that has long hindered innovation. However, as we integrate these autonomous agents into our ecosystems, the fundamental DNA of the IT role is evolving ...

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AI workloads require an enormous amount of computing power ... What's also becoming abundantly clear is just how quickly AI's computing needs are leading to enterprise systems failure. According to Cockroach Labs' State of AI Infrastructure 2026 report, enterprise systems are much closer to failure than their organizations realize. The report ... suggests AI scale could cause widespread failures in as little as one year — making it a clear risk for business performance and reliability.