So, just got through making my custom .iso again, disabled Cortana as much as possible without completely removing it (see my other thread about the start menu search feature), telemetry and a few other things. Contemplating completely disabling Windows update and using Mini Downloader all the time, the Update service is currently set to manual. I assume further updates to Win 10 will re-enable these things from what I've read, is there a way to prevent that (outside not updating). Cortana, easy just run one of the scripts to disable her. Telemetry looks like a not small deal to keep doing every update. Any input?
I'll go ahead and install Minitool like I planned, Windows Update service is currently on manual so it's only active when I want to download something. But I was most curious about the Telemetry and such what the verdict on that and whether or not updates reinstall Cortana and the Telemetry stuff (disabled Cortana and uninstalled the Telemetry features in .iso for install)
One solution is to make batch files that re-disable/delete things on start-up. As for Cortana, I disable it via this which can easily be made into an auto-start batch file (maybe anyway, I haven't tested what UAC does with this kind of thing but I have a feeling it'll do a UAC prompt on start unless you drop the UAC slider option down or disable it entirely): Code: reg add "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Windows Search" /v "AllowCortana" /t REG_DWORD /d "0" /f But more preferable, I use LTSB nowadays which doesn't have it. At some point in the past, an update did reverse some settings I had, but I can't remember which settings or what update exactly. My main procedure for keeping telemetry reversal from updates at a low is to just do clean OS installs frequently. The bare-minimum I'd recommend is after any CU's are released (monthly I think), but I usually go a few weeks or so.
Can't avoid it on my laptop, drivers are for Win10. I do have it installed on my desktop did the free upgrade from my Win 8.1 Pro license right before the period ended and all the info trickled in more. I like both but would certainly like not to need to worry about anything. I wish I had an Enterprise license to do LTSB. As for such reinstalls every month I have many programs that take a lot of setup to get working right and can take the better part of a day or so to get everything playing nice together (longer if I do some other things as well). Which is just too much work/time to have to do once every month or so. Cortana seems managable, it's the telemetry I'm more interested in keeping away, I've removed most (hopefully all) from the .iso so it should be fine for a bit as that was the January CU.