Add the ‘Windows Update’ icon back into Control Panel

Difficulty Level

You must have administrator privileges for this to work.

Directions:

Copy this code into a text file and save it with a .reg extension
Right-click on the file and select Merge
Verify in control panel that the icon is back

Or skip to the end and download the zip file with files to add and remove the icon from control panel

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{36eef7db-88ad-4e81-ad49-0e313f0c35f8}]
@="@%SystemRoot%\\system32\\shell32.dll,-22068"
"InfoTip"="@%SystemRoot%\\system32\\shell32.dll,-22580"
"System.ApplicationName"="Microsoft.WindowsUpdate"
"System.ControlPanel.Category"="5,10"
"System.Software.TasksFileUrl"="Internal"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{36eef7db-88ad-4e81-ad49-0e313f0c35f8}\DefaultIcon]
@="%SystemRoot%\\shell32.dll,-47"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{36eef7db-88ad-4e81-ad49-0e313f0c35f8}\Shell\Open\command]
 @="control /name microsoft.WindowsUpdate"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ControlPanel\NameSpace\{36eef7db-88ad-4e81-ad49-0e313f0c35f8}]
@="Windows Update"

To remove the “Windows Update” icon from control panel follow the same directions, but use the following code

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[-HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{36eef7db-88ad-4e81-ad49-0e313f0c35f8}]
[-HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\ControlPanel\NameSpace\{36eef7db-88ad-4e81-ad49-0e313f0c35f8}]

Winupdate.zip Download