Generate autounattend.xml files for Windows 10/11

My favorite trick is to install with English (World) language to avoid auto-install of all sorts of crap. Windows Store won't work in this mode, but it's just a matter of reverting to your preferred language after first boot.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows11/comments/15gk07n/english_...

Edit: in my experience, changing the language to something else immediately after install is done still adds the crapware automatically. I think I needed to reboot once or twice for whatever post-install service Windows runs to no longer get executed.

The level of workarounds that windows requires never cease to amaze me.

Since i‘ve been doing this sort of thing for many years here are some basic rules: - Get LTSC (W10) or IoT/Enterprise (W11) images to begin with - Get https://www.ntlite.com/ .. you won‘t find any other tool which does a better job at removing packages, adding drivers, etc. Worth every penny with great support. - Use GroupPolicies to configure your system. Take the time and download them for Office, Edge, Chrome, Firefox and update those that come with Windows. - Integrate drivers not only for the base image but also in the recovery and setup image. - Install a firewall (binisoft is fine) - Use NextDNS - If you don’t mind the security implications: Disable Defender, SmartScreen, BootGuard and VBS (use bcdedit) - Disable Microcode loading (delete the DLL) - Disable Spectre/Meltdown mitigations - If you need Office: Use the LTSC version

Most third party tools are outdated or do stupid stuff which isn’t needed. You can silence Windows with the right GroupPolicies quite easy.

> Always show file extensions; Use classic context (right-click) menu; Show End task command in the taskbar; Hide search box; Do not show Bing results when searching; Enable long paths; Prevent Windows Update from rebooting your computer; ...

I'd definitely love a .reg file generator website like this one, to apply some of these settings after the fact!

Hmm, no way to turn off the sticky keys shortcuts and similar; I hit those by accident _constantly_ on new machines.

I recently used this generator to deploy a fleet of Windows 11 Enterprise virtual machines in VMWare Workstation. Very nice.

I love the option for "Use a solid color background:" is Windows 95 background color. I love that color.

We need one of these for .debs. The answer files are easy to generate after installing once but it would be better to have an HTML ui that catered for every annoying .deb that can't think up sensible defaults for itself.

I could have definitely used this a few weeks ago! Very nice.

I've used unattend.xml to put C:\Users on a hard drive, leaving the rest on a SSD, so I don't need to think about what files go where. Documentation specifically warns against doing it that way, but I ran Windows 7 and 10 that way for over 12 years with precisely 0 issues with it.

Now I run Linux with / on a hard drive and /usr on SSD.

Does anyone know if it’s possible to disable autopilot/mdm with this?

could you please add enterprise iot versions? it looks great :)

Or you know, use the Windows ADK and do it like a pro. Sigh... This is a completely useless tool...

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