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I recently bought a Windows laptop for gaming (the only reason to still get one imo). The first thing I installed was a network inspection tool and proceeded to
by drexlspivey 5y ago
I recently bought a Windows laptop for gaming (the only reason to still get one imo). The first thing I installed was a network inspection tool and proceeded to spend the next 3 hours trying to get back some control of my computer by:
* Uninstalling tons of crap (Xbox Live, Edge, McAfee, Cortana etc)
* Blocking network access for many processes (Windows Defender Smart Screen, GamingServices, Search etc). The latter sends all your search queries to bing
* Fiddling with telemetry & privacy settings
After uninstalling Edge I still find places where functionality is broken because the OS doesn't respect the default browser setting.
- pDiddlyDoRight 5y agoI haven't taken the chance to dig into Win11 to know, but before Edge? Internet Explorer was bundled with Windows' Widget Kit. Uninstalling IE would break how applications would present to the user. Microsoft makes very weird, deeply hurtful decisions, at a depth very few people understand.
- judge2020 5y ago> Uninstalling IE would break how applications would present to the user. It makes sense for developers to use the native html renderer when they don’t want to have to include a big binary blob (Electron/CEF) to do so in their application.
- pygy_ 5y agoThe WebView API and the browser app are not the same thing. Uninstalling the latter shouldn't touch the former, nor should it break the OS.
- can16358p 5y agoYup. At worst, the bundled browser may use the built in web renderer if applicable for whatever reason perhaps. But it definitely shouldn't be the other way around.
- syshum 5y agoTheir decisions are easy to understand if you understand the motivations of the company. Which is not to please end user consumers buying retail consumer computers
- fortran77 5y agoMicrosoft doesn’t install McAfee.
- drexlspivey 5y agoYes that one and a bunch of others are coming from ASUS
- ecf 5y agoPedantic. Every Windows OEM is doing this and M$ seems to encourage it to make their windows devices cheaper.
- fortran77 5y agoMicrosoft Surface machines don’t have this. Microsoft doesn’t like it at all.
- rhexs 5y agoMicrosoft has every fresh windows 10/11 install automatically download garbage like candy crush. They don’t like it at all?
- vikingerik 5y agoMicrosoft hates McAfee and the other malware packages, because they know full well how badly they screw up all sorts of internal workings of Windows. Much of Microsoft's own tech support workload is caused by shitty antiviruses. The reason Microsoft made Security Essentials / Defender was to deal with that, to displace the others and reduce Microsoft's own support workload. Candy Crush isn't anything like that, it doesn't screw up OS functionality. (Well, subjectively, you might consider ads and upsells in the UI broken.)
- jeromegv 5y agoIf Microsoft doesn’t like it, they could prevent OEM from doing it through licensing. They don’t. It’s been like that for decades.
- rhklein 5y agoThere is a tool called ‚Shut up, Windows 10‘ that let‘s you deactivate all telemetry and other annoying features with one click.
- givinguflac 5y agoThanks I’ve been looking for something like this!
- MaxBarraclough 5y agoA pity that it's proprietary, I'd far rather that a tool like that be Free and Open Source. A reddit thread [0] suggests using a PowerShell-based alternative. [0] https://old.reddit.com/r/sysadmin/comments/3i766c/shut_up_windows_10_here_is_a_free_musthave_tool/cudv5om/ https://old.reddit.com/r/sysadmin/comments/3i766c/shut_up_wi...
- Kuinox 5y ago> I still find places where functionality is broken Windows uses Edge for webviews, you shouldn't uninstall Edge if you want these webview. While yes, using webviews to render things is awful, you shouldn't uninstall edge, it's like uninstalling librairies then complain about how things stop working.
- Eddy_Viscosity2 5y agoHow do you stop the network access for processes?
- drexlspivey 5y agoI am using an app called Glasswire, similar to Little Snitch for MacOS.
- wila 5y agoWindows Firewall -> Advanced Settings -> change default Outbound to "block" on public/domain/private profile.
- Eddy_Viscosity2 5y agoThanks, I will try this out.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- user_7832 5y agoBit surprised no one mentioned using the LTSC releases of Windows. They're absolutely barebones (no clock/news/weather, media codecs need manual install) but apparently significantly faster and less bloated, and they boot faster too. The only catch is I'm not sure how you can get one unless you're fond of the deep seas.
- GordonS 5y agoI'm pretty sure you can use LTSC editions if you have the Microsoft Action Pack. You can definitely get the Enterprise edition (I use it, and there are no ads). I forget how much it costs, something like $350/year from memory, but it's a no-brainer if you are developing for Windows, as you get access to loads of software, including Visual Studio, Office, something like 10x Windows desktop licenses and 5x server licenses, $100/m Azure credits etc.
- GekkePrutser 5y agoI tried out the latest one and it was actually pretty crap. The telemetry settings were the same as regular windows (no off setting), the same crapware was installed like the Windows store, microsoft accounts, news applets etc... I think the only thing it still has going for it is that it doesn't really change all the time. Oh and you can probably still install updates whenever you actually want to, because it's meant for production systems. The old LTSB of Windows 7 was indeed a really nice, light and no-frills windows release but LTSC has become almost the same turd that Windows 10 has :(
- Johanx64 5y agoThey used to be barebones. Now they aren't really. 21H2 version is bloated compared to early win10 LTSC builds. There's so much telemetry and so much Windows Defender bullshit, which is extremely hard to get rid off, but slows your system down tremendously. I can only imagine how bad full non-LTSC version of windows is like.
- technofiend 5y agoIt takes hours to finish, but tron script [1] automates at least some of what you did. It does however use kasperky for some tasks, so up to you whether you want to turn those bits off. [1] https://old.reddit.com/r/TronScript/ https://old.reddit.com/r/TronScript/