I just set up Win7 Ult in a 2nd machine, and I used Dism++ to control the updates. It's fast, works unattended, and skips the telemetry and Forced Win10.
Sometimes you're forced to upgrade. I kept WinXPPro safe for 3 years after "support" ended, but had to move to 7 for online work, and many new programs are x64. Impractical for me to run 3 machines in not enough space. But I'm staying with 7 as long as I can. I have it almost 3 years and I'm still learning the ins and outs.
Where can I get a count of my updates, without counting them myself??