Disable Bloatware, Tracking and other nasty stuff with PowerShell

Windows 10 comes with alot of annoying tracking features, bloatware and other nasty stuff. As long as the system is licensed as Pro Edition, it is possible to disable alot of this stuff with Group Policies.

Group Policies are normally managed by Active Directoy, which requires one or more Windows Servers. But Policies can also managed with PowerShell and the PolicyFileEditor Module.

Warning!

The following script was created for my machines. Some of it’s features may not suit you needs.

My script set-policies.ps1 will apply the following changes to Windows:

Group Policies

Disable the Windows Advertising ID
Disable data collection for the Input Personalisazion
Disable online tips
Disable cloud features
Disable telemetry and feedback
Disable data collection in Microsoft Edge
Disable Flash in Microsoft Edge
Disable interactive “New Tab” Page in Microsoft Edge
Disable Windows Preview Builds
Disable Microsoft Accounts
Disable Windows News and Interest Feeds
Disable Cortana, Cloud and Internet Search in Windows Search
Disable Windows Settings synchronization
Disable automatic Windows Updates
Download updates and schedule the installation every day at 03:00
Disable reboot for Windows Updates if a User is logged in
Disable Windows Update P2P
Disable device wake up for windows updates
Disable error reporting to Microsoft
Disable consumer experience reporting to Microsoft
Disable application telemetry
Disable auto connect to suggested Wifi Hot Spots
Disable OneDrive

Uninstall Bloatware

If the magic file C:\configs\enable-uninstallpackages.txt exists, the script will try to uninstall the following AppX packages:

3dbuilder
3dviewer
bingfinance
bingnews
bingsports
bingweather
disney
feedbackhub
getstarted
netflix
officehub
oneconnect
onenote
people
print3d
skypeapp
solitairecollection
soundrecorder
tuneinradio
twitter
windowsalarms
windowscamera
windowscommunicationsapps
windowsmaps
windowsphone
xbox
zunemusic
zunevideo
xing
king.com

The strings are used for searching for the full package names and can match multiple packages. Please check the list with the following commands on your system to make sure, that no package you need is uninstalled by mistake.

Get-AppxPackage -AllUsers -Name "*xbox*"
Get-AppXProvisionedPackage -Online | Where-Object { $_.DisplayName -like "*xbox*" }

Danger!

Careful! Some of the packages cannot be reinstalled by the Microsoft Store!

Other Features

Show last login info on logon (If magic file C:\configs\enable-logoninfo.txt exists)
Create symlinks for shutdown /r and shutdown /s on the Desktop (If magic file C:\configs\enable-trueshutdown-icon.txt exists)
Apply new group policies
Create a policy report at C:\Temp\GPReport.html