Unlike the previous versions of Windows, Microsoft Windows 8 does not notify you of the available updates and patches for the operating system. In Windows 8, all the downloading and installing of the updates is done behind the scenes. But if you want to bring back the old style updates notifications in Windows 8, then you can use the freeware Windows Update Notifier. It is a desktop application that stays in the notification area, checks for available updates, notifies you of available updates, downloads and installs them.
You can download Windows Update Notifier from its CodePlex website. The download is a portable application for Windows. Just download it, extract the contents to a folder and run it from there. It places an icon in the notification area of Windows desktop and starts looking for available Windows updates for your system. It not only looks for the Windows 8 updates but also for the Windows Defender updates.
However, if you want to have Windows Update Notifier download and install the updates automatically, then you have to run it using administrator privileges. To do that, just right-click on the WindowsUpdateNotifier.exe file and select Run as administrator.
You can open the settings for Windows Update Notifier by right-clicking on its icon and selecting Settings. In the settings window, you can choose to start it automatically with Windows, show Metro style popup, change the interval for checking the updates (by default it is 1 hour) and more.
Conclusion: Windows Update Notifier brings back the update notification feature to Windows 8 and 8.1. It allows you to automatically check for Windows 8 and Windows Defender updates every hour. It can also automatically install the updates as soon as they become available. This is an essential software for every Windows 8 user who wants full control over downloaded Windows updates.
You can download Windows Update Notifier from http://wun.codeplex.com/.