LadyA,

The Dell updates will sometime update drivers when they create one to possibly resolve certain things. It may not be all the time. You can either disable the updates and do it manually every so often or just let it do it automatically.

Okay, thank you... I do understand that it's my choice whether to keep it on or not, but I'm mostly just not clear on what it updates? All programs? Or only certain Dell ones? (Like if I disable it, which things should I then monitor and manually check for updates on every once in a while?)

Since it's "Dell Update" I guess it's obviously a Dell program, so does it only update programs that are from Dell specifically? Like "Dell Support Assist"? I can't think of any other Dell specific programs I have at the moment, but I guess there could be more.

Or is it checking also for updates to the factory installed hardware, for example? (I bought my computer, a Dell XPS 8500, preinstalled with Windows and other programs, so I assume the Dell Update program can read my Service Tag and check for appropriate updates based on the hardware it came with? Or am I wrong on that?)

Thanks again in advance!

no , ur not wrong. mostly for device drivers and such. but also the programs installed by dell.  funny enough, i seen this post right after reading yours. (down below) wanted to say, i turned off and uninstalled anything that does auto updates. i had some problems after going to win 10. once i got it working good, i dont want to mess anything up without knowing how it got there. i read somewhere else, dont worry about driver updates until u have something that is not working right, then try updating that item. otherwords, if its not broke, dont fix it.

hope im not confusing the issue

Okay, thanks! That makes sense, I think I will disable or uninstall the Dell Update then. I like the "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" option. :-) I'll just manually update things if something has problems.

I had actually checked to see if Dell Update was compatible with Windows 10 right after I upgraded, but I just figured maybe Dell hadn't updated its website to add Windows 10 yet (I've noticed a lot of programs and websites aren't listing Windows 10 yet). But still, I'm going to uninstall Dell Update for now.

Thanks again!

Unlike previous versions of Windows, Windows 10 provides all the drivers.  The only update you can get from Dell is the BIOS.