tfw2002

Doesn't make any difference I'm afraid, SystemSettings.exe and a few other UWP apps like Microsoft Store still preload even after killing them manually. There must be some way to stop these.

Noel, it stops SystemSettings from starting up every 5 minutes after being killed and it doesn't start on startup. SystemSettings still starts up for me on the Creators Update around the 5 minute mark, so I took a deeper inspection in the registry to see what was causing it. The critical 3 keys are the SystemSettings ones under [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsRuntime\ActivatableClassId\] and delete the Activatable named entries.

As a Windows user from Version 3.0, Win10 could've been better optimised without the Metro/Modern interface. Anyhow, there is a way to stop SystemSettings.exe from ever starting at startup. I will attach a copy of the modified registry entries for Win10 1703 64-bit. You will need to launch Regedit with TrustedInstaller permissions using PsExec or NSudo. Save a copy of this registry location... HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\WindowsRuntime\ActivatableClassId And compare with the attached tweaked version. This works with a local account, untested with a Microsoft account since I have no need to use one. Hope this helps. 10actclsidsrs2.zip

This works... Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}\shell\DevMgr] @="Device Manager" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{20D04FE0-3AEA-1069-A2D8-08002B30309D}\shell\DevMgr\command] @=hex(2):6d,00,6d,00,63,00,2e,00,65,00,78,00,65,00,20,00,25,00,73,00,79,00,73,\ 00,74,00,65,00,6d,00,72,00,6f,00,6f,00,74,00,25,00,5c,00,73,00,79,00,73,00,\ 74,00,65,00,6d,00,33,00,32,00,5c,00,64,00,65,00,76,00,6d,00,67,00,6d,00,74,\ 00,2e,00,6d,00,73,00,63,00,00,00 Tested on XP SP2. Dont know if it works on Win 2000/2003. Steve