Atari800XL

Sorry, what do you mean?

Hey Antonino, I have to admit, your suggestion about removal does seem a good solution here. For now, I will use (in a running system): powershell: Get-AppxPackage *WebExperience* | Remove-AppxPackage (Removes the icon on the taskbar, after a reset, or Explorer.exe restart). I guess I will use this on my install.wim next time, too, so it will be gone right from the start). Thanks again for all your suggestions.

Well, my initial question was reasonably simple, I thought somebody might have found a better solution than (for example) is mentioned in this topic on MDL: MDL - TaskbarDa (Widgets) registry change is now blocked As you might find from that topic, it's not very easy to do. I must admit I'm a little bit lazy, but some of the solutions mentioned there didn't work for me (yet). I just want my desktop to be as clean (and empty) as possible, just a blue background, no icons (I use my own apps menu and hotkeys by AutoHotkey), a single (OpenShell) start button (which I rarely use anyway), a network icon, sound icon and clock, that's it. Sort of like an Atari 800XL screen I guess :-) I don't see the need for any more superfluous stuff, it might be strange to some people, but I actually use the screen to display my application windows... I don't need 3 monitors either, I use Alt-Tab for that :-) (Tell that to some of my collegues/ friends, completely stupid to think you need a file explorer and email reader on a separate monitor). Oh, and don't get me started on the completely useless Windows File Explorer...

OK, so that's a solution for people how want to go the slimming/ pruning route. But the original question still stands: Is this also possible when using a pretty much standard iso/ install.wim, by using some sort of registry setting? Maybe JFX also has some idea when he's back from holiday :-) I was thinking along the lines of the other settings in the "Reg Tweaks" submenu. I read somewhere that this was related to the "TaskbarDA" setting or something, and that in newer releases, this setting is protected (that's why I thought it might be possible at the apply stage). Antonino, thanks for your thoughts on the matter so far.

Hi Antonino, sorry, I was not 100% clear. I've been around for a while and I know about customization, reg files, autounattend, etc. I was a bit unclear about the exact name of the new taskbar button, but now I've actually installed and booted the 26h2 version I was talking about on a test notebook, and the icon I was talking about appears at the bottom right, and is actually called.... "Widgets". I just want it gone from the taskbar, if there's a setting for it (registry maybe?) I would like to include it in my automated setup. If not, no problem, I will probably figure it out by the time I'm forced to leave my currently preferred Windows versions behind (LTSB2016, LTSC2021). But maybe by that time I won't be around anymore.

So what about that weather icon :-)

So here's me asking :-) Seriously: WinNTSetup is great for setting/ removing stuff at apply stage, before Setup is even started. This is why I love the "Remove/ Deactivate Defender" stuff etc. Now with that useless new weather/ news icon on the taskbar, I believe there's some "TaskbarDA" setting or something, but it's protected somehow and is harder to remove. That's why this one seemed a good contender for a WinNTSetup reg tweak (if at all possible). Maybe there are others for the newer Windows releases. I still use LTSB2016 and LTSC2021 as daily drivers, but I also want to keep up with the newer stuff (mostly for checking how I can turn off most of the "new features").

Of course not! Don't even jinx it by saying that :-) It's just that JFX is making so much money off this project, that he spends a lot of time on vacation on a tropical island... Also, the fact that MSFN has been offline for a while must not have helped... I just came here to check if there was any news surrounding the (not so much) updated 26300 release of Windows 11. If anybody knows what the latest and easiest way to kill that stupid weather/ news/ gadget icon in the taskbas is, please share it with us!

By the way, build 28000 was not as bad as I had feared, I created an install.wim from UUP, then removed Winre.wim, the size was not too bad (less than 4gb). And while we're talking about this particular build, here's the reg I applied to stop the TaskManager bug: (I'm not really interested in newer builds for now, I used build 28000 because I could use some files from install.wim in my ADK PE 28000) (PS: Also nice to see the "Remove Defender" stuff still seems to work - If anybody knows of recent registry settings needed to "clean" the latest builds, please share!!!) Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 # Resolve Task Manager process might continue to run in background after app is closed # Undo - Delete HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\FeatureManagement\Overrides\14 Registry Key and restore default values. # You will need to open CMD as administrator. Type the following command in CMD to Undo: # REG DELETE "HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\FeatureManagement\Overrides\14" /f [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\FeatureManagement\Overrides\14] # KB5067036 CU Main Feature Bundle, Enable Most features. ViVetool ID: 57048231 (CFR RKey: 1318466191) [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\FeatureManagement\Overrides\14\1318466191] "EnabledState"=dword:00000002 "EnabledStateOptions"=dword:00000000 # [Task Manager] Fixed: Some apps might unexpectedly not be grouped with their processes (Require 1318466191). ViVetool ID: 49407484 (CFR RKey: 4188347533) [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\FeatureManagement\Overrides\14\4188347533] "EnabledState"=dword:00000002 "EnabledStateOptions"=dword:00000000 # Addressing the requirement for a CFR Key in Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 28000 that Task Manager cannot terminate the process using the [X] button. ViVetool ID: 45036792 (CFR RKey: 4027031693) [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\FeatureManagement\Overrides\14\4027031693] "EnabledState"=dword:00000002 "EnabledStateOptions"=dword:00000000

Great to see an update, thanks for your continued support for WinNTSetup. Last week, I did some tests on the 28000 ADK and installed W11Pro 28000 too, just to see how bad they screwed it up this time. You're our only hope for removing all the junk (from the Setup, for one thing) and letting us use the basic NT core, which I guess is still OK for now. Best wishes for the New Year!

Thanks, but do you also know if something changed with this settings over the last couple of months, meaning the last few update cycles? Like I said, for me this has only been a problem for a couple of months now, I didn't notice it before that.

Thanks for your replies. I only noticed the slowness after clean installing (on a test laptop) the last few updated 26100 install.wim files. So first in march, then again in april. But I must admit I'm not 100% sure, it might have happened in months before that, I just might not have noticed. But maybe some update (integrated in the wim) was setting this "VerifiedAndReputablePolicyState"? (I normally don't use automatic updates, just reinstalls every few months with automatic postinstall of all my programs and data, works just fine and is 100% safe for me).

Thanks for your reply. Like I said, I noticed some unresponsiveness is a few installers after a clean install. I'm not sure, but to me it looked like this new "slowness" only appeared over the last few months (26100 only, with install.wim updated with W10UI by Abbodi1406). Changing that setting I mentioned solved that slowness, so I thought that was worth mentioning.

Does WinNTSetup use this setting in the "Disable Defender" section? [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\CI\Policy] "VerifiedAndReputablePolicyState"=dword:00000000 I have found that I have to add this in my own apply script to prevent some installers from becoming very slow and unresponsive after a clean install, I have only noticed this since a few months. I haven't tested with WinNTSetup, so I wondered if you used this setting all along? Not sure if something has changed with recent Windows 11 24h2 versions and/or updates, but I just wanted to drop the info here and ask if anyone else knew more about it. EDIT: Searching for this settings on the net I found some discussion about this would make the system unstable, so I'm wondering if any of you know something about that as well?

Thanks for the new version, very good to see you're still around. We need you in 2025 for all the ways in which Microsoft will try to screw up Windows NT! Hope you will have a great new year. I was actually just visiting this topic to write some holiday wishes, just to get rid of that "wish I could help you" message that was there for the last 4 weeks, I feared the topic was dying, but it's so wonderful to see the brand new version 5.4!!!