Sometimes, you just need to play a practical joke on someone's computer. Maybe it's flipping their screens, inverting the mouse buttons, or changing their wallpaper to a slideshow of Fabio — whatever you choose, it's important to goof around and have fun once in a while.

If you're a prankster at heart, you can now trick your friends with real-looking update screens from FakeUpdate.net. After opening the site, you can choose to display the update install screens for Windows 98, XP, Vista, 7, and 8.

Additional options include the Windows 10 upgrade screen (the free upgrade for which is about to expire), a Mac OS X startup screen, and install screens for SteamOS and Ubuntu.

Clicking one of the choices will open a real-looking update screen in a new page, complete with animations. You'll want to press F11 to put the browser in full screen mode for the most realistic experience. Then, all you have to do is wait (and keep a straight face)!

The "updates" never finish, so you can see how long your friends try to wait the process out. As an added bonus, pressing Enter on any screen will bring a fake blue screen of death (or the Mac/Linux equivalent on those screens), leading your victim to think that their system crashed.

If you're devious, you could make even pull up one of these screens yourself, pretending that your computer is updating so you "can't work." That wouldn't be responsible, though!

Having actual issues with updating your computer? Here's how to easily fix Windows Update issues when they occur.

Do you think your friends would fall for these screens? Let us know where you'll try them out below in the comments!

Image Credit: David M G via Shutterstock.com