Windows 10: How to set PDAnet as metered connection?

I made sure there was no downloading going on when I did the regedit, directly before I checked for updates (there was a defender update) and then rechecked after a couple times, there was nothing. I kept unconnected while doing it to be safe (hope that was ok). I did set everything to metered. I checked the ethernet connection in the settings after and it does say metered. I'm wondering if I should uninstall PDANet and reinstall it so windows thinks it's a new connection? I'm going to change my wifi back to unmetered only because there's no doubt in my mind I will forget to check WU/Defender.
I did look in Devices and both instances are unchecked but didn't see anything about setup being incomplete - could be because I don't have any devices "hooked" up to it - I don't print/scan from it. I saw my phone there under the Bluetooth but nothing next to it.
I think once I see that it's not updating without me letting it I'll feel better. I know you're busy this week so no hurry to answer. I may go ahead and uninstall/reinstall PDA and see what happens.....

 

Andrea,

It sounds to me that everything is alright but I am not clear about some of your statements -

About "I kept unconnected while doing it to be safe (hope that was ok). " - I assume you mean while you were editing the Registry. Running WU whilst not connected achieves nothing as it needs to be connected to find out if any updates are needed.

About "I'm going to change my wifi back to unmetered only because there's no doubt in my mind I will forget to check WU/Defender. " - If you are connected by WiFi then doing this will allow WU to run automatically. Is this your intention? I thought you were always connected through that PDANet thing?

About "I may go ahead and uninstall/reinstall PDA" - If your PDANet thing's [virtual] Ethernet adapter is showing as metered then that needs to be tested just to provide reassurance. Are the WU tests you ran referring to being connected through this Ethernet? If it finds any update [such as the Windows defender update which is issued a couple of times a day] but then waits for you to click the download button {as shown in the diagram I posted} then that confirms it is being treated correctly as a metered connection. Find out before reinstalling PDANet because if you have it working correctly then you do not want to disrupt it.

About "there's no doubt in my mind I will forget to check WU/Defender" - Whilst metered, you can still get Windows defender definitions updates running automatically by using Task scheduler as I mentioned before. I set mine to check at 0905 & 1805 daily but you can choose the times that suit you. See my post beginning "I appreciate what a blow Android 7 ...".

I am spending tomorrow on trains. What fun. I will only have my phone with me and writing anything longer than a couple of words is just such a pain that I know I will not attempt it. I am also spending Friday on trains but will definitely check in on Saturday if not before. [[On 31st July, I had just 12MB left so that was enough to check my email a couple of times - but I had installed the app for this forum on my phone as a test and as soon as I was connected it used up all my remaining allowance in about 10 seconds. Nobody understands us limited-data-allowance users at all.]]

Denis

 

See below:

 

Hi Denis, I connected to my phone this morning and went into WU and checked for updates....it started downloading them right away. I'm stumped. Ethernet says metered but when I went in to look at all networks it showed PDA as eternet2 if that makes any difference. I DID uninstall and reinstall PDA, didn't help. I have emailed them to ask for help but I'm at a loss. In the middle of all this my laptop is acting super temperamental, I'm in the process right now of doing a system restore back a few weeks. After I tried using the phone ►laptop to connect and saw that updates were downloading I disconnected, then reconnected after a few minutes to the wifi I had available, internet is barely working, chrome keeps freezing (I tried reinstalling), firefox was just going around in circles yet also had my phone connected to the wifi and it was fine. SO, think there's something wrong with my laptop which irks me because I barely use it for anything besides email and facebook.
BTW, I went into check what the data usage was for the last month in settings and see that Windows used almost 2 gb's, would that all be for updates? Seems crazy.....off topic but any idea how to find out what the heck is eating up my data? I've shut all windows tiles off, what else could it be? I looked in processes but alot of that is jibberish to me. Did see that there's some McAfee in the processes but I uninstalled all of that when I first got the laptop, apparently it didn't uninstall, would that be using anything? It won't let me delete it out of processes OR explorer. NO HURRY on an answer....

 

Denis! Good news! This morning after fiddling around with my laptop trying to fix the unrelated issues (all fixed), I decided to tether my phone again and check for updates. It said there were some available and then sat at 0% for probably 10 minutes (weird) but, after that, it finally popped up the message that there are updates and as soon as I'm not on metered data they will download so I think we finally have success!!!! YAY! Now, if I can figure out what else is sucking my data I'll be happy. Gonna take a lot of looking around to find it but I'm resourceful and won't give up!