NoelC

Don't think about the loss of function - that's meaningless since you're not supposed to want things to function any more. Try to concentrate on how much more secure everyone's systems are now, with that upgraded capability. Nadella waves hand, "These are not the attributes you're looking for..." -Noel

Thanks for the tip. Having them separate actually makes determining which ones can be terminated and still have full system function a little easier - for now. Notably my CPU was idle 99.30% of the time prior to the Creator's Update. Now it's idle only about 99.15%, so that shows the system is a bit less efficient at doing nothing at all. I have wondered whether managing all those extra processes might be the reason. I will experiment at some point. Having removed ALL the Apps except for the I've determined that I probably need to leave a few intact (Microsoft.Windows.SecHealthUI?), because Windows Defender was blown away afterward. EDIT: Scratch that, I have Defender working now with NO Apps installed. Woohoo! -Noel

Today I upgraded my Win 10 test VM, which was running a trimmed-down, all-business version 1607 build 14393.969 setup quite flawlessly, to the new Creator's update, version 1703 build 15063. I had to go find updated VMware Tools, newer than the version 11 VMware Workstation I'm using, in order not to have it black screen. And I disabled Aero Glass for Win 8+ completely, by both unregistering DWMGlass.dll and disabling the Task Sheduler entry for AeroHost. I also returned the desktop to the stock Windows 10 theme (I'm sure going to miss rounded controls with wonderful skeuomorphism for a while). Process count to support an idle desktop in version 1607 before the upgrade: 41 Process count after the upgrade: 105 (!!) Microsoft split most services out so that they run one per svchost.exe process instance. And they ALSO installed a buttload of additional bloatware - hence the title of this thread. In pursuit of an App-free, cloud-disconnected, private, desktop OS, I have begun the process of trimming it down. So far that's going surprisingly well. To my surprise, many of the things I had installed before remained functional - for example Classic Shell is still on task, and the Sphinx firewall is running fine. And they didn't even revert my UAC-disabling setting of the EnableLUA registry entry. Nice of them. But they DID reinstall a more Apps hosts and brokers and services than you can shake a stick at. So far I've gone through these things: Window title bars were too big, needed to run SetWindowsMetrics.reg. Needed to turn on System Protection (Restore Points). O&O ShutUp10 restored 7 settings that were made less private. Updated to latest release of WinAero Tweaker. Menu Show Delay Reduced Enable Balloon tooltips Disable Quick Action buttons in Actions Center Removed some Default Entries in File Explorer's context menu Customize Quick Access Item Disable the "- Shortcut" text for shortcuts Disable Windows Ink Workspace Uncheck Disable Password Reveal Button Turn off messages about firewall in Security and Maintenance Turn off messages about virus protection in Security and Maintenance Finish installing HP printer device software in Security and Maintenance (noted BITS attempted to contact fs.microsoft.com) (noted wermgr attempted to contact msftconnecttest.com) Windows10ReTweaker: Increase Privacy Remove OneDrive Set default optimization to General Items Unhide AppData and ProgramData folders Disable generation of hidden Thumbs.db files Disable Windows Search (SearchIndexer) service in Services.msc Disable SuperFetch in Services.msc Disable Sync Host_2efa9. Can only stop it in Services.msc. Needs to be disabled in registry: Run through the Settings App: System: Disable "Show me the Windows welcome experience". When I sign in "Use desktop mode". When this device automatically switches tablet mode on or off "Don't ask me and don't switch". On the taskbar, show windows that are open on "All desktops" Pressing Alt+Tab shows windows that are open on "All desktops" Devices Uncheck Let Windows manage my default printer Windows10ReTweaker: Remove all Apps Manually disabled the Network Connection Broker At this point an idle desktop has just 84 processes running, with no Cortana or other Apps and no cloud stuff, and uses 1.06 GB of RAM. I'm going to be continuing this quest, but I've already gotten far enough to be able to say that Win 10 version 1703 still can be trimmed down to be a desktop-only system. Microsoft hangs it on, I trim it off. It remains to be seen whether a system so-tweaked is any better than its predecessors. -Noel

I've been experimenting with upgrading a Windows 10 version 1607 (build 14393.969) system (in a VMware VM) to the Creator's release, version 1703 (build 15063.0). It looks like it's going to be prudent to fully disable Aero Glass for Win 8+ entirely (and switch back to the default Windows 10 theme if you've been using another one via UxTSB.dll) BEFORE installing the upgrade. I've been testing with Aero Glass 1.5.3.872 installed on the system prior to the upgrade. I had some black screens, a lot of dump files appearing in the AeroGlass directory, and some weirdness bling sounds at startup and "Other user" being shown on the login screen if it's not disabled first. LOL, my test system went from 41 processes running and 99.31% idle time with 1.02 GB of RAM used to support an empty desktop to well over 100 processes running right after installing the Creator's update. Part of that is because Microsoft seems to have split out almost all the services into separate svchost instances, but there's a LOT of bloatware added back into the system too. Of course now comes the task of trimming it all again. Sigh. -Noel

It produces sheep. It might ultimately lead to people being more aware and careful. That might take a long time, though. You can be sure that individually the folks who discovered bad guys read their phone number or home address and caused dire consequences are now quite a bit more careful, assuming they're still around. It's like neglecting to back up your stuff until after you lose it all. As a rule most humans don't learn much from other humans. Not even family. They need personal experiences to teach them that posting personal data online can have consequences. -Noel

Many users chose to upload their sensitive information to a site with an explicitly stated goal to "Showcase and discover" documents, and they were hoping for privacy? It's kind of tough to see where this is Microsoft being bad. More like people not being terribly sensible. -Noel

Make sure you've rebooted (not just shut down and start up, but a requested reboot; there can be a difference). Your best bet might be to post the debug.log from the Aeroglass directory. -Noel

Certainly they must be using Windows 10 for at least some things. On the other hand, I'll bet real money that there are still some Windows 7 systems running in the campus at Redmond as well. I used to be convinced that Windows would never turn bad as long as Microsoft had to use it to develop its own products, along the lines of "the geeks will continue to make systems that are good for geeks", but I don't know any more... There's got to be some kind of culture rot that's driving the whole thing down. I guess the serious 'softies might be running Server OSs. Or some kind of internal "Ultimate" builds. -Noel

Actually I was looking for the exact time and date the software was actually built from sources. Look at the Modification dates/times on the system .exe files to see that. It will tell us, in light of the numbers in the colored boxes above, how long Microsoft actually tests software before they send it out to the masses. I'm guessing it's only weeks, if even plural. -Noel

Out of curiosity, what's the build date of 15063? Look at the files in the C:\Windows directory for example. I'm guessing it's not even weeks old yet, and it's certainly only been known to users on the fast ring for what, a few days? You folks do realize that Big Muscle has to figure out what Microsoft did by looking at the machine code, right? Aero Glass doesn't use all documented interfaces. -Noel

Are you another one who thinks, as I do, that it's inevitable and just a matter of time? -Noel

Results seem polarized. I'm not surprised. -Noel

History tells us these things: Chances are that you'll be without Aero Glass effects for a little while (weeks or months), since major OS releases usually change the system enough that the undocumented interfaces Big Muscle uses change in ways he hasn't anticipated. Big Muscle doesn't like to be asked about support for unreleased systems. -Noel

Thanks for the 1.5.3 update, Big Muscle. It seems to work with my just-updated Windows 10 build 14393.969 test system. By the way, the version resource you have built into DWMGlass.dll still shows 1.5.2.847, though the debug.log shows the proper 1.5.3.872 version. Since you may want to fix that and repackage... Please allow me to make a request, since I'm starting to lose track of what works with what: Could you please identify/confirm all the files that should work together now: Of course we have AeroHost.exe and DWMGlass.dll from the 1.5.3 update. Which UxTSB.dll should go with the above? (I have 1.1.0.0 dated October 21, 2016) Which AeroGlassGUI.exe should go with the above? (I have an unversioned one dated October 2, 2016) The above SEEM to work together, and I do get the expected translucent borders and caption buttons from the ThemeAtlas file on the Settings App. Could you please consider packaging your current set of files that work together in one .7z file when you build versions of Aero Glass for Win 8+? -Noel

Post moved to 1.5.3 thread. -Noel

And for THAT we hail Big Muscle as an amazing software designer. Imagine if all software was this capable of adapting. -Noel

The first thing that comes to mind is: "That's not a bug, that's a feature!" It's getting hard to make the case that updates are positive things... -Noel

I'm very sorry to hear it seemed to slow down your setup, Jody. I haven't noticed it in my test VM, but I don't honestly run it enough to feel subtle changes. I'll certainly keep an eye open for that kind of thing when I finally update my workstation. I did compare PassMark PerformanceTest results from my VM and the host system, and the Windows Interface tests do measure a fair bit slower in the VM - but that may just be typical. I don't have stored PerformanceTest results for the VM from before the update to test against, though I suppose I could restore a snapshot and test... Over on AskWoody.com there are sporadic reports of the March updates breaking a Microsoft application called "MS Dynamics CRM 2011". I don't use that so I can't test it for myself. There's another report that the updates broke System Restore, but I've created a restore point and restored it successfully on my Win 8.1 test system. Lots of people find System Restore fails for them I think because they don't run it through the bootup Windows Recovery Environment. -Noel

Attempting to debug DWM.exe with Visual Studio nets a series of messages like the following. Note the large number of "Cannot find or open the PDB file" messages, especially for dwmcore.dll. That's a pretty good indication the symbols for the latest patch are not yet on Microsoft's servers. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\user32.dll'. Symbols loaded. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\uDWM.dll'. Cannot find or open the PDB file. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\win32u.dll'. Symbols loaded. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\dwmredir.dll'. Symbols loaded. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\dcomp.dll'. Symbols loaded. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\dwmcore.dll'. Cannot find or open the PDB file. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\dxgi.dll'. Cannot find or open the PDB file. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\combase.dll'. Cannot find or open the PDB file. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\ucrtbase.dll'. Symbols loaded. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\bcryptprimitives.dll'. Symbols loaded. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\kernel.appcore.dll'. Symbols loaded. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\oleaut32.dll'. Symbols loaded. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\msvcp_win.dll'. Symbols loaded. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\CoreMessaging.dll'. Cannot find or open the PDB file. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\imm32.dll'. Symbols loaded. 'dwm.exe' (Win32): Loaded 'C:\Windows\System32\uxtheme.dll'. Symbols loaded. For me the glass effects seem to work anyway, so it doesn't seem like too big a deal to ignore the message. -Noel

FYI, a data point not directly related to the "manual" method discussed here nor to 8.0, but possibly interesting or useful... On my Win 8.1 test VM I applied the Win 8.1 updates the normal way, save for the telemetry update (KB2976978, which I hid) and rebooted. I had two unexpected errors implicating an error enabling logging for publisher "Microsoft-Windows-Kernel-ShimEngine/Operational" in the System event log, and a "Registry Hive Recovered" message stating Registry hive ntuser.dat was corrupted. My firewall didn't work right after startup and in general the system just felt wrong. However, after another reboot all was well. Moral: Something about the recent updates may need two reboots before it all works properly. -Noel

I wonder how many % of users they catch each time they do that. Somewhere in Redmond must be a sign: We can't win 'em over with brilliance; just wear 'em down. -Noel

I definitely agree, there is much uncertainty, and a lot of the non-Microsoft manufacturer support will ultimately evaporate. In my own case I have two computers that are critical to my needs... A small low-end server system and a big Win 8.1 system that's a circa 2012 design high-end workstation, that even in 2017 is as potent as all but the newest/fastest systems. The server is a low power usage 2015 design running Win 7 that can easily saturate a gigabit Ethernet link with data, and it already runs Win 7 without ongoing updates, so it should be good enough for at least 5 more years, possibly longer. Based on what I can do now, the workstation hardware will be good for another few years at least. Then after that I'll probably get another, newer high-end off-lease workstation system with a lot of cores that will delight and amaze for a while longer - conceivably all the way into the low 2020s. The key is that today's high-end workstation hardware is still capable of running Win 7 and 8.1. There are already drivers for current accessories, for example NVMe drives that can sustain 3+ gigabytes/second I/O and quite fast video cards. It's not a cheap path, but it's a possible path. -Noel

I'm thinking 8.1 might be a safe haven because the powers that be aren't thinking we 8.1 users are a big group that needs to be pushed off our current systems as hard as Win 7 users. -Noel

No worries. It's the Aero7 theme by Sagorpirbd (from DeviantArt) and my own theme atlas for Aero Glass for Win 8+, which changes the caption buttons to what you see above from something that looks like Windows 7. The nice thing from the Aero7 theme is that the controls in older software take on some needed skeuomorphism, and rounded corners. -Noel

The .png and .png.layout files are in the zip files named above. Feel free to alter them. You have to figure out where and when the various parts composite. I do that by overlaying them in Photoshop with bright colored pixels, saving the .png, reloading the atlas via the Aero Glass GUI tool, then seeing what parts of the desktop are affected. -Noel