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↑ This right here is the best answer in this thread.
For further nagware avoidance, remember that the Enterprise editions of Windows come bundled with the group policy editor (gpedit.msc, stick that in your run prompt) and will respect group policy settings with the intent of system administrators having control over various components and features.
In your case, a the system administrator is you.
For the purposes of decluttering your start menu specifically, for instance, I'll link everyone to this comment I wrote the other day which lists off the policy settings you'll want to mess with — including disabling Copilot completely.
You need the https:// portion in your link, else it doesn't work for others
https://lemmy.world/comment/21313354
(Also thank you, I'll be saving this link myself 😄)
Yes, edited. I usually use Alexandrite and copying links from it is weird.
Hey, it’s the guy who makes all those amazing posts about knives! I’ve ordered many a knife because of you.
Love his ridiculously in-depth reviews, read 'em all! Not even a knife guy!
I would only add that OP should have O&O ShutUp on their PC and run it after the initial install, and then make it a habit to run it after system updates. It also helps you delete Copilot.
LTSC+Privacy.sexy
Great thank you I’ll check it out
Could you get away with running it on a vm? I did that for some college classes that needed specific programs.
I did this and had some success with it during the semester, but when it came time for exams, we had to install anti-cheat software with the assistance of the university's IT department. They realized that a VM is a pretty effective way around the software, so I had to take all my exams with a proctor staring at me.
That anti cheat software usually is worse spyware than what even Microsoft can dream up for windows 11. so i would use a „burner device“ for that anyways that will be formatted after the exams. No way I would let any of them access my personal data.
To build on this answer, maybe it's possible to install and boot win11 from a removable drive?
Theoretically, but it would probably be slower than dogshit if you tried to do it over e.g. USB, and the administration would probably also not be pleased with you spending the entire exam with an external storage device conspicuously bunged into your computer.
You could grab a cheap (relatively, these days) low-ish capacity SSD in whatever flavor your machine takes and install Windows on that with your primary drive removed and safely stored away somewhere, though, and then just swap them back when you're done.
If you want something to do with your secondary SSD afterwards there are enclosures you can get that'll convert an NVME SSD into a super fast USB flash drive sort of arrangement, albeit typically dangling on the end of a short cable rather than sticking directly into the port, which makes a good modern day stand-in for those portable laptop hard drive enclosures nerds used to carry around in the early 2000s.
Could you not create a separate partition on the internal drive for Windows 11 and boot from that? That’s how I would do it for MacOS or Linux installs.
You can, but on the same drive they will share the same bootloader. While Windows officially can share its EFI partition, be aware that updates may rewrite it, and might not bring your other install along. This is fixable, but still very annoying if you have some expertise on Windows boot setup commands.
This is why I always to prefer to setup multiboot systems on separate drives with their own EFI partition, and always use the non-M$ install for the boot menu.
Even better. Make them bleed money for relying on Microslop.
Oh fuck this I'd drop out
so I had to take all my exams with a proctor staring at me.
much much better than having to install spyware. a proctoring spyware could record your precise mouse movements, keypresses and build a profile out of it, or upload anything from your computer to its developers. but a proctor person? what will they do, take notes? they only see what you show them, and by using a different OS account they really can't see anything sensitive.
https://github.com/Raphire/Win11Debloat
Run after your upgrade. :)
Yup, this is the one I've been seeing in a lot of guides. I'm not sure how it compares to the other ones, but it was easy enough when I tried it.
The process for a clean install would be something like:
- select the region and keyboard but do not connect to wifi, instead hit
shift+F10and runstart ms-cxh:localonlyto have a local only account - Once the desktop loads, connect to the Internet and (assuming the recent Windows update didn't break everything again) run updates through the UI
- Run Win11Debloat to remove/disable junk and to make common adjustments
- Run
appwiz.cplfor anything that was missed
Bonus
- Winget for apps (or UniGetUI if you prefer a GUI)
- WinHawk and PowerToys for quality of life improvements
You can try Chocolatey too, but I gave up on it recently because of constant errors and questionable community packages
I use ninite to do basic utility installations on fresh installs too... https://ninite.com/
But yeah, I've used it with both Win 10 & 11 for the last few years. Very simple, but great.
Same issues with Chocolaty as OP, ninite is the bomb and always up to date.
i used to use the tron script to clean up my win10, is that no longer a popular practice?
The most correct answer so far is Win11 IoT. But there's a good chance it won't have enough "windows" for your school needs.
If you're just trying to get work done and not trying to stick it to the man with the purity test that this thread seems to insist upon, you can install normally and force an offline user. (Microsoft keeps threatening to kill this capability, it still worked last time I tried early last year.)
Then run Chris Titus debloat utility before you set up anything else.
If you don't have a registration, you can activate it with massgrave.dev.
If you're just trying to get work done and not trying to stick it to the man with the purity test that this thread seems to insist upon
School for my healthcare career had several "virtual clinical experiences that were graded and required windows. They did help us memorize the basics a little before touching a real patient but they were probably also spyware in the grading functionality. In the end though I didn't have a choice. Some of us just don't, especially those of us picking careers in public safety. I'm just grateful they provided the iPads for when we used the charting software that required iOS.
Use an answer file with W11 Pro.
https://schneegans.de/windows/unattend-generator/
I haven't noticed any AI bullshit, but I might be being protected by EU laws at the moment.
This works very well if youre technically inclined. I have to set up windows sometimes for people and this lets me simply select the drive then it goes. No one drive, local accounts, no bloatware, etc. Super nice.
It's not that difficult, is it?
I mean, it's not like running a program on an already installed windows, or using the windows 11 installer to install from windows.
Otherwise, it's the basic steps for installing any OS except for creating the unattended.xml file.
Use the media creation tool to create install media on a USB drive, work through the generator (Google what you need to), drop the resulting XML onto the drive, reboot from USB and install as normal.
I've only used it with ventoy. Didn't know if you could plop it in the root of a normal flash drive that has the windows installer or not.
Not really hard with ventoy either but I don't like to assume what's easy for me is easy for someone else.
Yeh, ventoy takes an extra step (but ventoy is itself an extra step): find the iso from a legit source instead of using the media creation tool, install software to edit iso, add unattended.xml to the iso, plop iso on ventoy drive.
Anyone playing around with or working with Linux/windows:
Check out ventoy. I think they've solved their issues of binary blobs and it is so useful.
Create a Ventoy usb drive. Drag any and all OS ISOs onto the USB stick. Boot from the USB, choose which ISO to actually boot.
Want to switch flavours of live Linux (or try another installer)? Boot from usb, choose different ISO.
Absolutely fantastic software
Any normal install of W11 can be cleaned up a fair bit just by manually refusing permissions and disabling unwanted features. For all the memes, very few of the features people complain about are forced on.
After that the biggest fixes I'd recommend are editing the registry to remove online search in the Start Menu, which makes it very workable (although there is a redesign incoming, not sure how that'll interact) and installing PowerToys to get a universal search shortcut and a bunch of really nice QoL features.
W11 is actually perfectly usable after some customization, honestly.
Can't believe lemmy hasn't buried you for this comment. I don't have any of the issues I'm told I'm suffering, and I actively look for them when I see articles posted. The circle jerk is strong.
I suspect most of the hate is people running the factory install of 11 Home from their laptop manufacturer. Pulling the crap out of Windows is about the same effort as adding needed crap to Linux.
Is it your laptop bought with your own money? If so, how the fuck can they dictate what OS you use?
If not, why the fuck is it your problem to install the OS?
All of this sounds fucked up to me. You're being forced to use the shittiest os filled to the brim with the shittiest ai.
They are probably running some specific software that requires it.
I agree that they shouldn’t have picked Windows but it makes sense to keep everyone on the same software stack to avoid wasting time helping people install basic stuff that might or might not run on their systems
Well yeah, it's your laptop and your responsibility to install stuff.
So the main reason you're going for windows is because you're afraid you won't know how to install stuff on linux and won't get any support from the college?
Fair enough, but you did say you are a Linux user, so that shouldn't really be a big problem. Things like wine and VMs also exist to help running windows apps.
Wine is by no means a stable option for all windows software. Some windows stuff just will not run on Linux. And not all laptops are capable of virtualization.
My uni let me use linux alternatives but I had to do some serious debugging by myself. The biggest issue was caused by snap LOL
how the fuck can they dictate what OS you use?
"You need this software, which requires Windows."
Okay. I'll run it on wine and if that doesn't work, i will run it in a VM.
As other people have mentioned, works fine until you need it for exams.
Some professional software licensing options dint work in vms, either.
Solidworks single-seat licenses won't activate in a VM, for instance.
Not saying that's OPs specific use case, but it's an example of another constraint
Yeah. From experience, even moderately powerful laptops can run a win11 ltsc iot VM pretty easy, and that runs everything you need that wine can't.
For reference, my current laptop has an 8th gen i5, 32 GB RAM. I use the VM for Lightroom, affinity. Runs perfectly fine with 4 Threads and 16 gigs of RAM.
Schneegans is pretty well respected. An answer fully used in combination with Ventoy gives you quite the professional install, repeatable on hundreds of machines.
My concern is that someone unfamiliar would want to spend some time understanding the process before diving right in.
Given the amount of research, I suggest using Rufus for the offline install portion and then running the debloat scripts mentioned elsewhere.
Here's a Privacy Guides...guide to make your Windows experience better. https://www.privacyguides.org/en/os/windows/group-policies
Privacy Guides' Community Wiki have some helpful guides too. https://discuss.privacyguides.net/c/community-wiki/9411
Atlas OS is one of the most user friendly solutions imo. Its also filters updates for easy long-term use.
Have you tried revi.cc?