[liendolucas]

From the WinUtil screenshots presented in the article I'm absolutely shocked about all the things that you presumably want to turn off or delete to have a "clean" Windows (to some extent if that's possible at all). It's also ridiculous that you need an external tool to easily disable/remove/uninstall every single thing you don't want .

I haven't used Windows since many many years ago and the few times I sit down to interact with someone else's computer I suffer so much that after a few seconds I simply give up, I can't stand anything about it.

If someone were to use Windows, besides WinUtil, are there a set of recommended open source scripts to clean up all the shit out of a fresh Windows installation?

Just to be aware in case of emergency or extreme need...

[Esn024]

Winhance for removing things like OneDrive and the option to KEEP them removed even if a future Windows Update tries to reinstall them. You can also save your configuration to easily get all your preferences back on a fresh Windows install. I use this instead of WinUtil (which I haven't tried yet... is there any way in which it is better?).

Windhawk for quality of life improvements if you don't like some of Windows's defaults. For example, I use it to have two rows on my taskbar and smaller icons (which was disabled in Windows 11), always open Classic Notepad instead of the new one (it loads much faster), and add multi-step "undo" to the Classic Notepad (the only thing I didn't like about it), among other things.

[ripharamberip]

It's just so crazy that we are living in times where a notepad can be too slow. Wtf has happened?? How can they mess up a fucking Notepad App? Luckily I switched to MacOS mostly some time ago. Also has its issue but nothing compared to winslop

[sznio]

> Wtf has happened?? How can they mess up a fucking Notepad App?

they made it use Electron

[subscribed]

W10privacy has the same. I have a strict set of changes I apply in 5 minutes after every update.

[BLKNSLVR]

It was the need to do increasingly more post-setup configuration with each iteration of Windows after Win7 that finally pushed me to using Linux as my daily driver a few years ago. Especially when a few of these settings would get switched back to defaults after a Windows Update.

These days, the amount of background services that Windows runs just makes it feel as if Windows itself is increasingly malware. You don't need a virus present for modern day machines, with massive compute resources, to be bogged down and running like a 486 back in the day.

[II2II]

And that is just a fraction of what WinUtil does ...

It has been a while since I booted Windows, but I am fairly certain you can still circumvent the OneDrive nonsense (which is what the article is about) by setting up a local account. There are likely simpler ways, since Windows still has the concept of local file storage. That doesn't excuse the dark patterns, but it does highlight that we sometimes over complicate solutions.

[ikr678]

They made it very difficult to create local accounts on win11.

[ChrisClark]

You suffer so much you give up in a few seconds? That's a bit dramatic and inflexible for someone that knows computers

[duskdozer]

Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC IoT version. Official support until 2032