MDA 2021 – Important announcement on a change to Windows Update behavior impacting Shipping Drivers on Windows Update requirement

Created Date: 2020-09-15 | Last Modified: 2020-11-05

Applies to: Named, TVO

Key Update Summary – November 4, 2020

We have added new information and dates related to the Shipping Drivers on Windows Update requirement.

Update

Microsoft has established November 12, 2020, as the date when Windows Update Driver Auto-Promotion will be disabled for Windows 10 clients versions 2004 and later. The 90-day transition period outlined in the original communication below will begin on November 12, 2020, and end on February 10, 2021.
A new release of the MDA Validation Toolkit with version 2020.11.01.0 will be available on the Device Partner Center portal prior to November 12, 2020. This version of the toolkit will no longer generate warnings once Driver Auto-Promotion has been disabled.
Partners are expected to use the 90-day transition period to re-test systems having CSUP.txt dates of October 1, 2020, and later to correct any failures caused by drivers being incorrectly published to Windows Update as Manual Driver Updates.

Please email mdahelp@microsoft.com with any questions or feedback.

Definitions


Shipping Driver	A plug and play (PnP) driver that is preinstalled on the OEM image but was not included in the default Windows source media.
Manual Driver Acquisition	An improvement to Windows Update that changes the behavior of how Windows Update offers drivers to customer systems. Details on this project can be found here.
Driver Auto-Promotion	The condition where Windows Update promotes a Manual Driver Update to instead be an Automatic Driver Update, because there is otherwise no matching driver available, or because only a generic inbox driver is installed on the local computer.
Automatic Driver Update	The condition where drivers that are published to Windows Update as Automatic then enable Windows Update to download automatic updates to customer systems, when the driver is a better match than the driver currently installed on that system.
Manual Driver Update	The condition where drivers that are not published to Windows Update as automatic can only be acquired manually by the customer, once Auto-Promotion is disabled.
MDA Validation Toolkit	The toolkit used to validate many of the MDA requirements. This toolkit as also known as MDAVT, and can be found here in the DPC portal.


Shipping Driver	A plug and play (PnP) driver that is preinstalled on the OEM image but was not included in the default Windows source media.
Manual Driver Acquisition	An improvement to Windows Update that changes the behavior of how Windows Update offers drivers to customer systems. Details on this project can be found here.
Driver Auto-Promotion	The condition where Windows Update promotes a Manual Driver Update to instead be an Automatic Driver Update, because there is otherwise no matching driver available, or because only a generic inbox driver is installed on the local computer.
Automatic Driver Update	The condition where drivers that are published to Windows Update as Automatic then enable Windows Update to download automatic updates to customer systems, when the driver is a better match than the driver currently installed on that system.
Manual Driver Update	The condition where drivers that are not published to Windows Update as automatic can only be acquired manually by the customer, once Auto-Promotion is disabled.
MDA Validation Toolkit	The toolkit used to validate many of the MDA requirements. This toolkit as also known as MDAVT, and can be found here in the DPC portal.

Introduction

The Publication of Drivers and System Firmware on Windows Update (“WU”) requirement in MDA Milestone 1 was changed for the MDA 2021 program year to allow for any version of a Shipping Driver to be published to Windows Update, as long as the driver is published as an Automatic Driver Update. This change was made to align MDA with the Manual Driver Acquisition already underway, where the behavior of how Windows Update offers drivers will be changing. A key change to the Windows Update behavior will be when Driver Auto-Promotion is turned off for Windows 10 clients, versions 2004 and later. This Driver Auto-Promotion change is expected to deploy in October of 2020.

The MDA Validation Toolkit has been updated in release 2020.09.01.0 to support the validation of program year 2021 requirements, including validation of the updated Windows Update driver publishing requirements. This updated version of the toolkit is not yet capable of determining whether a driver has been published as an Automatic Driver Update until Driver Auto-Promotion on Windows Update has been turned off in October. This can cause a situation where a partner who is self-testing to generate a passing result for the MDA requirement prior to Driver Auto-Promotion being disabled will later be flagged as a failing result when the system is audited and Driver Auto-Promotion has been disabled.

Resolution

Microsoft appreciates the ongoing effort by OEMs in republishing drivers as Automatic Driver Updates through the Microsoft Partner Center portal. We understand that not having a tool available that can reliably determine if the driver was published correctly is a concern for many of our partners.

In response to this feedback, Microsoft requests that OEMs continue to make a best effort attempt to publish drivers as Automatic Driver Update for all systems, including those with a CSUP.txt date within the 2021 MDA program year.

At the time that Driver Auto-Promotion is disabled, Microsoft will release an update to this partner communication to notify partners in the MDA program that the MDA tool should now correctly display accurate results for this requirement. When Driver Auto-Promotion is disabled, Microsoft will provide a 90-day transition period for OEMs to validate and submit the required drivers to WU as Automatic Driver Update. Systems that are audited after this transition period are expected to be fully compliant with the Automatic Driver Update requirement.

Technical Details

When executing the MDA Validation Toolkit, which uses the public Windows Update API to query for available driver updates, Manual Driver Updates would be promoted to Automatic Driver Updates by Driver Auto-Promotion. However, by default Windows Update will not offer a driver update unless it is a better match than what is currently installed on the local system. This results in situations where the tool would not find driver updates that are still compliant with the MDA requirements.

To work around this issue, the MDA Validation Toolkit instructs Windows Update to ignore any currently-installed drivers when checking for available driver updates. Therefore, when Driver Auto-Promotion is enabled, every driver update appears to the toolkit as an Automatic Driver Update, even if the driver was only published as a Manual Driver Update.

Feedback

Please submit feedback or questions to MDA help alias at mdahelp@microsoft.com.