Did you already experience the situation where Windows misbehaves after an upgrade?
Bad security patch, bad monthly patch cluster (quality patches), or something bad with bigger functional updates?

In a good case of luck, you have a reliably working backup where you can restore a disk image of the Windows partition.
But depending on how "clever" you set up your system (whether you separated OS and user files, etc.)
restoring a backup could also mean a loss of the most recent changes.

Luckily, there is a solution to delay such upgrades to decrease the likelihood of running into such issues.
You can use Windows Group Policy Editor to delay patches and updates for getting more stability in Windows.
Then you are not under the first to get new stuff that is not well tested.
Especially useful for Windows 11, where nowadays many things are changing.

Group Policy Editor

The Group Policy Editor (gpedit.msc) provides a nice GUI to fine-tune such things.
Note: this tool is not available in Windows Home!
So it is better to get Windows Pro (or alike) to have such possibilities for not playing the beta tester for Microsoft.

What updates can be delayed?

What you need to fine-tune is the delay for
a) receiving the monthly quality updates and security patches (up to 30 days), this controls
    monthly cumulative updates, including:
    - Security updates
    - Optional non‑security preview updates
    - Bugfix rollups

b) receiving prereleases and function updates (up to 365 days), this controls:
    - Feature updates (e.g., 24H2 → 25H2)
    - Insider Preview builds

You need to balance this delay to your demands in the spirit of "that it makes sense".

For a), I choose 14 days so that security updates are not delayed too much but to give Microsoft a chance to fix any potential "bad patches" within a time frame of two weeks.

For b), I would make it dependent on the version of Windows. In Windows 10 (with extended support), not much is changing anymore; there, I feel safe with a delay of 180 days. Windows 11 is getting too many changes for my taste; there, I would recommend delaying prereleases and function updates for 365 days to get a real stable platform for DAW use.

Setting it up in less than 5 minutes

As Administrator: gpedit.msc

Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Windows Update > Windows Update for Business
1. Select when Quality Updates are received                                                        ... e.g. 14 of 30 days
2. Select when Preview Builds and Feature Updates are received                           ... e.g. 180 of 365 days

In der deutschen Windows Version:

Computerkonfiguration > Administrative Vorlagen > Windows-Komponenten > Windows Update > Windows Update für Unternehmen
1. Beim Empfang von Qualitätsupdates auswählen                                             ... z.B. 14 von 30 Tagen
2. Zeitpunkt für den Erhalt von Vorabversionen und Funktionsupdates auswählen ... z.B. 180 von 365 Tagen

Backup still needed

Please note: this improves the availability / reliability of the system but does not replace a working backup of the system disk.

Recommendation: Macrium Reflect Home is a proven software that, thanks to features such as ‘Rapid Delta Restore’, both speeds up the restore process and reduces wear on SSD cells, as only data that needs to be changed is written back.
Restoring a compressed disc image of 600–800 GB takes only about 10 minutes depending on how long your BIOS POST (power on self test) takes and how fast your CPU/SSD is. And this is fantastic!