Does Fresh Start install updates one by one?

I used the "Reset PC" function in Windows 10 (1803) and now it's installing all updates "one by one". Well, many of them are rolled up into "cumulative updates" but still, each "feature update" is apparently installed separately. Which is a slow procedure (and prone to hanging indefinitely, which requires my manual intervention).

If I had used "Fresh Start" instead, would that mean I directly get the newest Windows 10? Or would it mean I get Windows 10 1803 and have to wait through all the update installations just the same?

Solution 1:

To update Windows 10 to the latest version, surf to Download Windows 10.

That gives you the choice of updating your PC there and then or downloading to USB flash drive or DVD, without the need for downloading all the updates from 2018 and onward.

After this is done, the next time you Reset Windows 10, version 21H2 will be the version that will be installed.

If you have stored any data on the computer, ensure you have backups.

Solution 2:

I used the "Reset PC" function in Windows 10 (1803) and now it's installing all updates "one by one". Well, many of them are rolled up into "cumulative updates" but still, each "feature update" is apparently installed separately.

There is a significant difference between Windows Update, downloading cumulative updates, and it downloading 20H2 (the earliest feature update still supported). Since the machine was running 1803, when you performed the Reset, you simply reinstalled Windows 10 version 1803. If it's anything like my past experience, Windows Update was likely downloading one of the supported feature updates (20H2, 21H1, or 21H2) and attempting to install it, but it encountered an error in doing so. So what you actually saw is multiple attempts to install the same feature update. If you were running a supported version of Windows 10 you could use the Setup Diagnostic tool that exists to determine the reason the feature update could not be reinstalled.

Now in the past I have had significant difficulty, upgrading older versions of Windows 10, once they were unsupported. In my case I had to upgrade to each incremental feature update, because I wanted to keep the files on the system, if you don't care about keeping files you can skip that process and simply download the current Windows 10 Media Creation Tool or the Windows 10 Upgrade Assistant. Please note that actual upgrade process, that is performed is identical, between the three methods of installing the feature update.

If I had used "Fresh Start" instead, would that mean I directly get the newest Windows 10? Or would it mean I get Windows 10 1803 and have to wait through all the update installations just the same?

There is virtually no difference between Reset and Fresh Start. The only difference is that Fresh Start downloads a fresh Windows 10 image while Reset uses the image stored on the machine. Fresh Start absolutely does not download a current Windows 10 image, which means, in either case you would have reinstalled Windows 10 version 1803.