ptd163

Not a fan of DWS_Lite? I've had good experiences with it plus it's FOSS. I knew about O&O ShutUp10, but I didn't know about W10Privacy.

Are those 4 packages the only packages you have in your Windows 10 installation?

Don't try and remove ShellExperienceHost. I've tried removing it already. It completely breaks any kind of context menu, the native start menu, and Cortana. Not sure what else is breaks though. It's also probably needed for Settings. An application called Process Lasso has an "always terminate" feature so that might be useful. It's a got a free and paid version.

I'll check it out, but I have to say I'm not a fan of italic windows titles.

I've made the changes you called for, but I still don't see that much improvement.

I just don't get it anymore. Why won't Microsoft just capitulate to the fact that Windows 7 is best version of Windows and Windows 7 v2.0? Sure they'd lose some face, and it might be seen to some as a defeat, but if you think about the long term they'd garner a much larger adoption rate.

I tried all the software you mentioned and was not able to achieve anything close to your screenshot.

Y'all got anymore of them group policy startup/shutdown scripts?

The only thing I'm really looking forward to is coloured window being officially support so we don't have to hack them in. That memory management thing is cool I guess, but meh. Until DirectX 12 adoption kicks up Windows 10, as a primary OS, is dead to me.

Although your definition of few is a little warped, funny you should mention that Noel.

It's as if the presence of the store made people forget the internet exists. Most of the paid apps in the store are just scams of what is actually free software. Most notably, 7-zip. I don't care though. Let the sheeple keep throwing away their money.

I don't have money to spend on software that I will rarely use at best and never use at worst so I'm guess I'm stuck with free software like TinyWall. Oh well. Thanks for giving free/built-in software a fair shake Noel.

Yes that's what I'm saying and I used Win Toolkit. It worked without issue for me. Yes, please do. I have not figured out a way to completely uninstall Cortana from an online system and would like to know how.

Why go through all that effort when you can just remove the Cortana and Search packages? It passes SFC and updates still work.

No. Removing the associated packages completely and permanently removes Cortana.

Enable the Use classical drive grouping in This PC option.

I uninstalled Cortana by removing the packages from the .wim file with Win Toolkit.

"Windows Insider Program manages this option". So one could think you need to have opted into insider builds for to this to have any effect and if you've obliterated the telemetry and data collection operations like most of have you're not eligible for the insider program so you don't need to worry about it. Although considering the path Microsoft is on with W10 I wouldn't past them to just force it on everyone.

KB3075249, KB3077715, KB3078667, KB3080149 were served by Windows 7 WU as optional updates yesterday. What's the verdict on them?

Isn't that what TinyWall does? It's not a firewall itself either, but controls the Windows Firewall as well. Those are my goals too and why I'm using the LTSB. Btw Noel, your link to Windows Firewall Notifier is 404ing and after having imported the policy into my en-us LTSB VM it loses its internet connection. I will investigate.... if I can figure out how to do that.

Do you have policy files that you feel are ready for public consumption yet Noel? Would do wonders for unattended installs.

After trying everything I could think of to get the Do not pre-launch SearchUI and ShellExperienceHost options to work I removed the Cortana and Search packages from my image as a last resort.

R4D3 has another thread on this topic if you care to read it. http://www.msfn.org/board/topic/173615-windows-firewall-rules/ You could also try TinyWall. Blocks everything by default (yes, everything. I had to whitelist Firefox), but lets WU still function.

This is actually one of the few changes I don't care about because: I didn't ever need or use Media Center. I just plugged an HDMI cord directly into my video card if I wanted to play something on my TV. I don't play DVDs/Blurays with my PC. I play in my TV's bluray player like everybody else. Hypothetically, even if I did play DVDs/Blurays with my PC it would be with VLC which comes with its own set built-in codecs.