Disabling UAC/Metro and Never Looking Back

[NoelC]

At my company I've just completed a thorough evaluation of WIndows 8 / 8.1, and have decided to roll-out Windows 8.1 with local accounts and UAC disabled. This will give us the benefit of using an up-to-date Windows OS which provides virtually all the desktop functionality of its predecessor, Windows 7.

This was not a decision taken lightly, and frankly it seems a bit weird to just turn off an entire subsystem (Metro/Modern apps are completely unavailable with UAC fully disabled), but it works. It's compatible with all our tools and processes, and there are even a (very) few things it can do, like mount an ISO file for direct access, that Windows 7 couldn't.

You might ask the question, "if it's not really any better than Windows 7, why bother?", and that's a fair question.

In the end it comes down to it being impractical to remain on an old operating system forever, as keeping current does have intangible advantages. Just think about the folks still trying to run XP or earlier in this day and age... Sure, for a while that was viable - and in fact, we've run Windows 7 quite successfully up to now - but it just grows out of date and the support costs go up. New applications are released that don't support it. Driver writers no longer care about it.

So here we sit, essentially running Windows 8.1 setups you could say are more like Windows "7.0.1", employing an unprecedented amount of 3rd party software to restore functionality that Microsoft has just chosen to abandon (thank you to the 3rd party developers who have taken it upon themselves to correct that). I guess we're good to go for another year or two.

-Noel

[jaclaz]

like mount an ISO file for direct access, that Windows 7 couldn't.

Well, for the record third party tools (that you seemingly use for removing "features" of Windows 8.1) and BTW more thatn one Freeware, exist to mount/access .iso since the dawn of time and suitable to all recent NT based systems, surely including XP and - if I remember correctly - even 2K.

jaclaz

[NoelC]

You're saying that the removal of the option of having a Start Menu is a "feature"? Or that removal of theming and Aero Glass is somehow a "feature"? The removal of the GUI for setting up a regular Windows Backup?

And yes, I know well that 3rd party tools have been around to do most everything (I had Alex Feinman's ISO Recorder on Windows 7, for example). But more of them than ever are required now to make Windows 8 functional.

And besides, I wanted to list at least something that the new OS does that we needed. Couldn't think of anything substantial. ALL we got by upgrading is the security of knowledge that we're no longer using an arbitrarily obsolete OS.

-Noel

Edited November 14, 2013 by NoelC

[dencorso]

Would you mind listing exactly which 3rd and giving a more detailed how-to? It seems you've come up with an already mature (well enough tested) procedure... I'm certain this will interest many and, then again, some of the feed-back may help improve details of your original procedure, too.

[jaclaz]

@NoelC

No, I was saying that what the good MS guys call "features" are the things that you (nicely ) removed, while the only "real feature" (the mounting of the .iso) that you listed is not really-really "news", as it was available (via third-party tools/drivers, and JFYI also through MS's own VSS driver) since a long time.

As dencorso suggested - it would be very nice if you could provide a list of the add-ons/third party tools that you "adopted" in your setup and I am sure that a lot of people would be interested in more details on the exact procedure you followed to have the install result as a "better" Windows 7 or Windows 7.01. :

jaclaz

[vinifera]

you'd have far less trouble finding free ISO mounting app (there are few doing good job, and not only ISO but other images as well)
than installing win8 and finding bunch of hacks and apps that restore win7 functionality

[NoelC]

It's a bit beyond the scope of this forum to list my entire book of tips, tricks, tweaks, and 3rd party software (yes, I have written a how-to book called Configure the Windows 8 "To Work" Options). Here's a super-abbreviated executive summary overview with lots skipped... Keep in mind this is for a system optimized for desktop, serious use, not playing with toys from the App Store.

• Do a clean install from a disc into a blank partition if at all possible, and don't partition.
• Plan to have everything on C: because it just works better.
• How to install with a local account.
• Install the ClassicShell 3rd party Start Menu replacement.
• Turn off UAC (really off, as in EnableLUA == 0) as mentioned above.
• Disable HomeGroup networking, just use workgroup networking.
• Tweak File Explorer in several ways, including hiding Favorites and setting Folder Options for reliability and better usability.
• Set up Windows Update to ask you before installing updates, and install a 3rd party update notifier that works more like the one in Win 7.
• Tips on setting up your desktop, such as putting Explorer.exe before UNC names, to improve efficiency/reliability.
• Minimize chrome around windows to maximize working space, along with registry settings to go beyond what the control panel of Windows 8 provides.
• Setup of various taskbar properties, such as auto-hide, enabling the Desktop toolbar, etc.
• Registry tweaks to speed up a lot of the animated UI elements to make the system snappier to use.
• Set up a C:\TEMP path with proper permissions and point TEMP and TMP variables to it.
• Set Windows disk caching settings for best performance.
• Setup so the Advanced Boot Options screen always shows during bootup for a few seconds.
• How to set up IE for best security, and installation of a custom "hosts" file to block parasite web sites, ads, tracking, etc.
• Good practices for setting up drive letters and naming.
• Configuring power settings (not necessarily very green, but better for the computer)
• Use netplwiz to automatically log your system on at bootup (if you have good physical security).
• Configure the items in the system tray.
• Configure to prevent password expiry.
• Advice on selecting Avast! alternate anti-malware software.
• Configure System Restore storage to be deeper, to enhance the chances of it working when you need it.
• Our favorite list of 3rd party applications tested to work together well, including Aero Glass for Win 8, Shortcut Overlay Manager, Send To Toys, WizMouse, ShellFolderFix, grepWin, Scanner, HWMonitor, 7-Zip, Windows Update Notification Tool, Folder Options X, and more.
• Add the Quero toolbar to IE to give it back a search box, and what setting to change to keep it from causing problems.
• Really disable the ridiculous indexing feature of Windows (not trivial, but doable).
• Get a better calculator application from an XP system.
• Advice on creating system and password recovery media.
• Things to disable to get back gigabytes on your disk.
• Set up to see more detailed status messages so you can see what Windows is doing.
• A complete description of how to use Windows Backup integrated with Shadow Copies by scheduling wbadmin commands.
• Good practices for ongoing stability and keeping the system light and fast, including using Autoruns and Shell Extensions Viewer.
• Advice to avoid registry cleaners. Just don't use 'em.

I've been developing this for a long time, since well before Windows 8 actually. I also have a book for tweaking Windows 7. I've been running Windows 8 in virtual machines since the first day of the first pre-release.

The list of things you can do to Windows to make it a lot more useful is big and growing. Since Windows 8 / 8.1 are moving toward powering toys (tablets and the App Store) it's harder than ever to make it useful, and ever more 3rd party developers (like this forum's own BigMuscle) are swinging into action to make it work better, or restore lost functionality. Thing is, we've tested a whole set of configuration changes and 3rd party software together and can say that not only have we made a more useful system, but it's reliable and sustainable.

Hope this helps!

-Noel

P.S., I wanted to paste in URLs, but this forum still won't accept pastes from IE11 and it's too tedious to type them in. You folks ought to fix that.

Edited November 15, 2013 by NoelC

[NoelC]

you'd have far less trouble finding a free ISO mounting app (there are a few doing a good job, and not only ISO but other images as well) than installing win8 and finding a bunch of hacks and apps that restore win7 functionality.

That may be true, and we've kept our main development workstations on Windows 7 up to now, but there is a very real - if intangible - benefit to keeping current. As time goes on more and more software is written for and tested most on the latest version, drivers aren't developed as vigorously for the old OS, the security environment grows out of date... The list goes on.

Windows 7 is by no means obsolete today.

On the other hand, take it to its extended conclusion... Decide to never upgrade from Windows 7. Do that and in another big part of a decade you'll be sitting where people today trying to run XP are at. It's obsolete, some applications no longer work with it, and by comparison to modern systems it's unstable.

Better to make the newest OS work really well and have the best of both worlds. I've done it.

-Noel

[lurk&jerk]

I agree with most of your practices except putting everything on C:\. As cheap as storage is nowadays I recommend using two hard drives and putting just the OS on C:\, especially if, as you seem to indicate, you are keeping System Retore copies on C. That partition has got to be huge and if your drive goes bad, you're toast unless you make backups to a NAS or some external storage. And I would be interested in knowing how long it takes to retore the C:\ drive in the event of a disaster.

In our environment, I actually dual boot Windows 8 by re-purposing old copies of Windows XP to each client's D:\ drive. Then, if something happens I can boot to XP and quickly delete locked Windows 8 files or restore the OS if it has been hosed.

-------------1ST PHYSICAL DRIVE-------------C:\WINDOWS 8D:\WINDOWS XP-------------2ND PHYSICAL DRIVE------------E:\APPS\DATAF:\BACKUP

Edited November 16, 2013 by lurk&jerk

[NoelC]

Of course we make backups to external storage. We use Western Digital MyBook USB drives on every system, actually, and do system image backups every night.

When I swapped drive arrays I was able to restore the system overnight - via USB2. With USB3, which modern external USB drives support, it's just a few hours. A disaster recovery restoral shouldn't need to happen very often! Never, ideally - I can't understand why people try to save money on disk drives. The cost in lost time and potentially lost data can be ridiculous.

The advantages to building an SSD drive array from multiple physical drives and running everything from it are numerous. The speed truly adds together, and of course everything on the volume the system thinks is critical is equally well protected.

Once upon a time, with electromechanical disk drives you could save a bunch of seeking and thrashing by having different applications use different drives, but those days are kind of past... Now with big RAM caches and SSDs that truly have zero seek time, the thinking on best practices needs to change.

This is not theory, it all comes from observation of real results; I've been running Windows systems since Windows existed (and real computers before that).

-Noel

Edited November 17, 2013 by NoelC

[NoelC]

P.S., on our largest systems I actually do have some electromechanical internal drives in addition to the drive C: array - for when 2 TB just isn't enough.

-Noel

[dencorso]

Of course we make backups to external storage. We use Western Digital MyBook USB drives on every system, actually, and do system image backups every night.

When I swapped drive arrays I was able to restore the system overnight - via USB2. With USB3, which modern external USB drives support, it's just a few hours. A disaster recovery restoral shouldn't need to happen very often! Never, ideally - I can't understand why people try to save money on disk drives. The cost in lost time and potentially lost data can be ridiculous.

Right! Image nightly backups to External USB 3.0 TB-sized HDDs is the way to go (And WDC the best choice ATM, IMO, too!).

[DosProbie]

Good Stuff Noel! , Yep not a big Metro fan either (like the weather app is all) I became tired of the tedious setup after a clean install of setting up all your favorite default apps off of the metro ones in the option list, so I wrote a script that overrides all that so apps like VLC and Xnview are the defaults now and another script to toggle metro on or off just in case I want to use metro in future...DP

[ptd163]

Is there any way to use Metro apps with EnableLUA = 0?

Edited November 21, 2013 by ptd163

[NoelC]

I'd like to know that too.

According to Microsoft there is no way to run Metro/Modern apps with EnableLUA set to 0, but with products such as ModernMix out there, one is left to wonder whether there could be a hack to get it to work...

-Noel