RanCorX2

The dark theme thing is so gimmicky, i tried it ages ago on photoshop, on my last phone (windows) but went back to light theme. I don't see the appeal and now because people are fapping over it, ms are adding to windows 10 as yet another new "feature". at least we won't be forced to use it.

or you can look in fridge before going shopping and make a list of what you need? some tech is just not needed unless you are rich and lazy or both.

hmmm....spend thousands on a mac computer or spend a few hundred on a pc. macs in my opinion are for graphic designers or people who think they need a mac because they want to do graphic designing. when they could just build a cheap pc and then get photoshop for windows instead. (or get an older version that's not got the cloud crap) plus when stuff goes wrong on a pc, you don't have to waste time contacting apple for support, you do it yourself.

you want to download windows update mini tool and add it to control panel, you can find it on the mdl forums as well as other sites, but they are probably less trustworthy. disable auto updates and update when a full windows build goes public, that's what i do, i stopped bothering with updates sometime ago as they do not install properly on my machines, they always fail after the reboot with the annoying failure configuring updates error, been like that since 8.1, up to 8 updates usually installed fine without errors, only a few failed. Then something changed and updates fail to install, happened when ms switched to big chunky updates rather than small hotfixes.... the odd small update installs fine.

I remember the rules, abandonware is not mentioned. shouldn't this thread be closed / locked / deleted if it's breaking a rule?

saying abandonware doesn't exist is just ignorence. boo hoo..piracy if everything was illegal, no one would be selling old copies of windows on ebay etc. anti piracy people tick me off with their "i'm a good person, i don't pirate anything" bs. technically, we all pirate stuff, as piracy is described as using / copying other peoples work, happens all the times and is not limited to computer software. example; i see a good picture somewhere and reproduce it for my enjoyment i tape something off the radio i tape something off the tv oh no p i r a c y dun dun daaaaa.... now if i was to steal plans for something and market it for my own gain, that would be bad. making something useful that hurts no one and is not for personal gain is fine in my books.

you only remove the uwp apps as they are useless crap, the whole thing is worse than steam with it's sandboxed bs. at least steam games can be moved easily from pc to pc without requiring re-downloading on the slow a** and buggy store. how old is the store now? it still sucks. windows 10 as a windows os is not that bad, it's quick and stable, it's the modern crap they piled on that is the problem. uwp apps, modern start menu, settings app, the xbox integration, countless new services, lots of new background processes and of course the telemetry.

if abandonware doesn't exist, why is it in the dictonary? https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/abandonware https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/abandonware https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/abandonware

it's true, the post setup thing is little annoying on rs4, best thing to do is click no on them all. removall all preinstalled apps & store install classic shell or startisback and then setup everything else.

What I do now is only install a new rtm builds and don't bother with updates, the system is crap in windows 10 and too intrusive, don't bother signing up to insiders either. Instead look for direct downloads of rtm isos and create a usb install. avoid the store, windows update and uup, download rtm builds from other sources for a less painful experience.

you can safely disable all event logs, even the standard ones and stop the service, but then you miss some error descriptions, i disable them all but leave the standard ones active, application, system, setup and security.

what was your friend doing to get that much malware installed? i found ghostery pointless if you have ublock as it does the same blocking, it also made some of the browsers i tested it on sluggish because of the unoptimized plugin, didn't work well on IE11....but hey what does? i use opera + popup blocker for chrome + ublock origin + ublock origin extra + ubscope + df youtube distraction free + tampermonkey with anti adblock killer & iridium for youtube don't need a hosts file with ublock.

created a load of batches i'm naming windows 10 lite, which do the following; hyper-v - removes packages not required for basic virtual machine use (can still add ide or scsi virtual hdd's, use remotefx vgpu etc) removes fibre channel, smb, host guardian, pmem, basically things that the average home user most likely will not use, same goes for all the other batches. windows defender - removes sense client, network inspection, management, device guard, application guard speech - removes the speech engines and any related files language features - removes all extra language packages but leaves core language pack intact (applies to en-US & en-GB users) any other language users will need to edit batches. two batch files can be copied to winsxs once you take ownership, these remove ALL language files / folders, again, for en-US / en-GB users, batches will need to be edited for other users. optional features - removes ALL optional features except; .NET, Hyper-V, DirectPlay, WMP, IE11, Powershell misc removals - removes a bunch of other packages that won't break windows. tablet pc - removes all packages related to tablet pc's, devices with sensors, screen rotation etc. batches will be uploaded when finalised, still some testing to do.

made some good progress on my mini project, i've removed 50% of the runtime components (the core of the new windows that was introduced in 8.x), thousands of reg entries and also 90% of the services that were added in windows 8-10 and am still happy to report i have a working os. shell exp host + settings app + defender, only apps installed now. removed the following appmodel components; shoulder tap, perception, lights, proximity, hotspot, wifi direct, perception, holographic (hydrogen, lens etc), edge, point of service, payments, xbox (xbls, gamesave, gamemode, gamemonitor, gamebar, storage etc), cortana / search, softlanding, enterprise stuff, onecore speech, bioenrollment, alljoyn, backgroundtransfer, cdm, print3d / printing3d / printdialog, store, share experience, sharedpc. smartcards, targeted content, wallet, broadcast dvr, workplace, cloud domain join edit; wiped all registry traces of windowsapps and system apps (except the sechealthui which is used by defender), there were multiple locations in each reg hive so i created some ps scripts to remove those entries, had to use wild cards because they had version numbers that matched current installed os version, so they are removed by name of package and not by full key name. organised removal files in a directory structure that gets copied to c:\ from wherever you store them, you simply drop some of the bat files on the runasti exe (that removes protected keys with trustedinstaller as owner) some are not protected so they can just be run normally, ps scripts need to be run by right click and run with pshell, they create a temporary ps drive with access to full reg hive, the standard access via pshell hides lots of keys.

using a hex editor i've managed to remove cortana from the settings app, will see if i can remove the other stuff that doesn't do anything now like xbox, lockscreen etc, otherwise there's some useless buttons that just crash the app or just do nothing. edit, i'd much rather remove the crappy settings app and get some of the lost cpl settings back, i've added back display settings but it doesn't load atm, most of the registry data was missing so i added it back from windows 8.1 which still had a working display cpl, i think i need to replace some files next to see if that works... looks like settings app is here to stay, spent all day investigating but couldn't restore old display settings, only got a blank settings box to show up for title bar sizes under the display cpl, back to hex editing the settings app..

if anyone is still interested, i'm still working on removing stuff from windows 10 that is the modern components, leaving the win32 stuff untouched. i'm in the process of sorting registry keys and categorising the lot, lots of guesswork and testing of removals... split things into the following categories; (bracketed numbers equal components selected for removal) core (21) example CCortana core_immersive (10) example CICortana immersive (15) examaple ISearch windows_runtime (26) example Windows.Devices.Lights related components (22) stuff related to above but in it's own catagory i'm just guessing what C, CI & I mean in front of some reg entries, so gone with the above. when i'm done it'll be uploaded to my onedrive.

the main modern components of windows 10 seem to come under WindowsRuntime and i think it's connected to the now discontinued WindowsRT OS as the RT in that stands for runtime and there are dll system32 on windows 10 with RT in the descriptions. Windows 10 S replaced WinRT, the runtime seems to be one a core components of windows 10 as it's linked to many things. i'm now doing removals of runtime components, so far i've removed store, payments, point of service, wallet, cortana, accounts control, biometrics, cloudexphost, holographic 5000+ reg entries removed and OS is still functional, taskbar / start menu and settings app are all working fine. i'm only removing the modern core stuff, not touching anything else. completely killed the lock screen, doesn't throw up any error or cause the normal lock screen to freeze or not function, instead of the the modern lock screen appearing the standard one just appears like on previous windows versions. these removals might be useful for creating a light windows 10 iso and will be much safer than ntlite.

gave up using powershell as it was too frustrating and trying to find good examples of code is very difficult as there doesn't see to be any "simple" methods to take ownership of multiple registry keys/subkeys, at least i couldn't find any....the only semi decent script i found doesn't like long lists of reg keys, it crashes powershell if you make the list too long, also slows down with loads of errors if you have already taken ownership of some keys but add more to list and re-launch the script, so for me it is useless, not buying "powershell is awesome", give me command prompt anyday... subinacl was useless, says registry keys don't exist for some in list and ones it found said access denied, couldn't work out if setacl did subkeys any examples were not to be found, only ones dealing with keys and not subkeys... ended up finding runasti on github and have added that to some batches to delete reg keys as trustedinstaller, seems to do the job and no bs.

still working on appx removals, so far done the following; removed - windowsapps folder, printdialog folder, infusedapps folder support files for cortana, maps, contacts/mail/calendar rt, biometrics, gaming/xbox (gamemode, gamebar, xbl etc, but keeps gip for xb one controller support), store, content delivery, cloud experience host, aad (azure active directory) and some other files trawled the registry and removed 99% of references to the system apps and store apps, some things have to remain for the following to work; settings app - all registry entries shell experience host - all registry entries (including pen workspace and action center as they point to shell exp host, so i left them alone) one or two reg entries that referenced cortana which when removed broke the start menu (i've made a blacklist of entries not to remove) i've made scripts to delete all the above and have categorised them in a folder called Registry\HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT , HKEY_CURRENT_USER and so on wildcards have been used and powershell and standard batch files, also psexec as there was several hundred clsid, instance entries to take ownership of and delete but the powershell script couldn't handle the length of the list and kept crapping out...so i just used psexec to merge the reg file that deletes the entries under the system user which seems to work. still got a few hundred more entries to test delete. also made a batch file to remove optional components listed under Windows Features in programs and features. (leaves you with the core optional features .net, ie, wmp, directplay, powershell) and finally language cleanup which consists of; winsxs lang file removals, system32/wow64 lang file removals & registry lang entry removals example - uk users installs en-GB pack, then you can remove en-US, however if you try removing en-US files with no other pack installed you will brick the OS. so if any other language pack is installed you can remove the default en-US files my winsxs folder is down to some 10,XXX files and that's without touching ntlite, just install wim tweak and some batch files. (was 14,XXX+) scrubbed the language file removals, does break some things, probably why i archived my original batches...

You spent 4 grand on a mac? Thanks for the new years chuckle too, also not sure how a 10 year old macbook would run windows 10 better than a modern pc, considering you have to run it via bootcamp and the bootcamp may or may not have reduced battery time and other issues, the page for the macbook lists 2012 models and up which is not 10 years ago. I like to think of apple products as flashy stuff that fits into the category of buy it because it looks cool and but then regret it later because it cost so much, I just never saw the appeal. The only apple product i've owned was a used ipod but eventually got a used windows phone, upgraded it to w10, added a 200gb msd and found a folder mp3 player app, way better and more useful as i can listen to stuff either on earphones or from the phone speaker.

^ you can find them on my onedrive in my tweak thread.

well, as for any cheapish tech, it works for some, hit n miss stuff.

you could just turn off automatic updates via the registry or using windows update mini tool. about your fathers chuwi, that's to be expected from a macbook ripoff, only have to look at the reviews to see they aren't very good (no offence), doesn't mean i'd buy a macbook though, as i don't like apple, too expensive and gimmicky, you pay for the brand and not the specs, you could pay loads and still end up with a low end machine. i only go for laptops if they can be upgraded as it makes them last a hell of a lot longer than some expensive doorstop.

insider builds shouldn't be called updates, they are full windows builds for either fresh or upgrade installations, they are the next major release of windows 10. i.e. the next rls will be redstone 4 and the current builds are just beta's of rs4. I just wait for the final build and then upgrade, saves time. nothing exciting about a new build, just bug fixes and probably more app crap and extra features. more stuff to disable. upgrading windows is probably only good for; latest directx security fixes latest dxva support (for the average user) for some reason users fap over each new build....not sure why. i enjoy reading about each new build and how ms is still terrible at fixing stuff, lost count how many times i read that users couldn't install an insider build because of some error or bsod. i used the feedback hub once and nothing got fixed or added as a new feature. (aspect ratio controls for wmp) users been asking for years...ms doesn't add it. pfftt..useless feedback hub. would love to ditch codec packs and an extra media player, would be a few less things to install on a clean install of windows. my current list of install software is 14 on a clean install which takes less than 30 minutes to install and setup.

The thing i hate the most about w10 is windows updates, they always get to 99% on the reboot and then it's "undoing changes" such a broken pos. all started when they decided to do these massive all in one hotfixes rather than little ones which usually installed just fine. I can't remember the last hotfix that actually installed 100%, must of been on the original windows 10 rtm or 8, the more stuff they change the more stuff they seem to break. i'm at the point where i don't even bother with updates anymore, i just wait for the next full w10 build to go public and upgrade. i guess the only way to apply updates would be to add them to an image and make an iso but i can't be bothered to do that as you have to keep updating the iso and then install windows again.... (i've tried the restore health thing which is also broken as it always asks for source files even when the source is specified, i just gave up in the end as my install works fine apart from updates not installing) as for apps, they suck too, i didn't find any useful ones for use on pc, only on my windows phone (a free mp3 player called audiobit with folder playback) it seems apps are tailored for tablets and phones, they are just too basic and dumbed down for desktop use, that and the store / platform is a useless pile of garbage as you still can't backup downloaded apps and games because of encryption & file, folder permissions it's true what they say, the platform is a wall garden, you can't move stuff to another pc, only to another drive on your pc, if you try and move say a game, your loose the file, folder permissions and the store wants to re-download the game and at 50+gb and the slow download speeds it's a pita. apart from all the broken and useless crap, windows 10 is nice and stable (apart from the very first rtm which sucked) i don't bother with insider builds as i can't be arsed to upgrade again and again so soon. honestly i wish they'd ditch the insiders thing as all they keep doing is adding more features that are of no use to the average user, it's just an excuse to make windows more bloated. i don't see the point of including enterprise stuff in pro or the mixed reality stuff when that should be an optional feature and not a built in feature, making edge built in, keep expanding hyper-v stuff which again should be in enterprise as it's probably not going to be used by home users, as we have vmware, virtualbox.