Windows 10 Settings menu: The Update & recovery tab

If you’re looking for Windows Update, look no further — Microsoft has completely removed the icon from the Control Panel, and it exists only in the new Windows 10 Settings menu (at least, in Windows Technical Preview Build 9926). In fact, it’s possible that Microsoft will do away with the Control Panel completely by the time Windows 10 is ready to drop.

Anyway, if you want to update your Windows PC, you’ll now have to do it through the Settings menu. The Update & recovery tab is where you’ll find Windows Update, along with a section for Backup and Recovery. Windows 8 users, this should look similar to the Update and recovery section in the PC settings menu, but it’s not exactly the same.

Under Windows Update, you’ll find (almost) everything you need to update Windows. At the top of the screen, you’ll see a status message that tells you whether your PC is up to date, and when your computer last checked for updates. If you want to manually check for updates, click Check for updates.

For more Windows Update settings, click Advanced options. Here, you’ll be able to choose how updates are installed (you can now schedule your update restarts for a specific time) and view your update history. To see details on a specific update, just click on the link below it that will either read “Successfully installed on…” or “Failed to install on…”

If you’re running the Windows 10 Technical Preview, you’ll also see a section that says Choose how preview builds are installed (you can choose “fast” — with potential bugs, or “slow” — with fewer bugs), but I assume this section won’t exist in the final version of Windows 10.

In Backup, you can set up your backup settings — toggle your OneDrive backup on or off (app data and/or Start layout, passwords, favorites and other system settings), or add a local backup location to your PC. Both backup options have Advanced Options links, but at the moment these just take you to a new screen where you can click Back up now to manually backup your data, files and settings.

Random, insignificant observation: On the Backup screen, both “Advanced” and “Options” are capitalized, while on every other screen, secondary words are all lower-case.

The Recovery section is exactly like the Recovery section in Windows 8’s PC settings menu, with three options to help you fix your computer. Refresh your PC without affecting your files walks you through fixing your PC without erasing it (System Restore), Remove everything and reinstall Windows walks you through, well, reinstalling Windows, and Advanced startup restarts your PC so you can start up from a device or disc, or restore Windows from a system image.