Suggestions/Ideas on ways to strip down W11 EVEN more

obfuscation · Dec 20, 2023

Hi everyone, new to this forum but I figured there would be more likeminded people here than say, the microsoft forums lol

Basically, I've had an itch to make the most barebones Windows 11 install since I switched from W10. I already have the "basics" down. Stripped down ISO, winutil, disabling very obviously useless services and processes but I want to take it a step further.

I understand at the point I'm at, there is no performance gain from going further specifically in gaming, which is basically the only thing I use this box for. This is purely to make "small number go smaller". Any suggestions on processes I missed, that could safely be removed without breaking Windows?

Attached is a complete list of my processes at this point.

https://imgur.com/7t7uVjj

FreeBooter · Dec 20, 2023

Those are processes that we have to go over everyone to suggest to you which to disable if you want your computer to be fast, then it's hardware that makes it fast for example make sure your computer have big RAM size to run any service and programs i have 16GB RAM i only tun off background apps which saved few megabytes of RAM space.

obfuscation · Dec 20, 2023

FreeBooter said:
Those are processes that we have to go over everyone to suggest to you which to disable if you want your computer to be fast, then it's hardware that makes it fast for example make sure your computer have big RAM size to run any service and programs i have 16GB RAM i only tun off background apps which saved few megabytes of RAM space.

I mean you're not wrong, but you're missing the point

This is just for fun, I really don't need to do anything. I would have the exact same system performance if I had 30 or even 100 more processes running in the background because I'm not lacking in RAM or CPU cores. It's just fun to tinker and see how far I can go before something breaks.

Not to mention that the placebo effect is a very real thing :)

glasskuter · Dec 20, 2023

obfuscation said:
This is just for fun,

Welcome to the forum.
Just speaking for myself. There are a few folks here that are like-minded to you so maybe one of them will step in, but most of us don't gamble with unknown factors...and there are a lot of them. We may tweak here and there, stop a few KNOWN safe processes and startup apps, but we don't play with our systems for the sake of playing. We want full functionality and there's a reason most of Windows processes and services are there whether we know that reason or not.

Ghot · Dec 20, 2023

Get REVO Uninstaller (free) and use it to remove apps that you don't want.
Make sure to use it's "scan for leftovers" after the uninstall of each one...

Revo Uninstaller Free

Download Revo Uninstaller Free helps you to uninstall software and remove unwanted programs easily. Remove all uninstall leftovers and traces

www.revouninstaller.com

Things I removed...

obfuscation · Dec 20, 2023

glasskuter said:
Welcome to the forum.
Just speaking for myself. There are a few folks here that are like-minded to you so maybe one of them will step in, but most of us don't gamble with unknown factors...and there are a lot of them. We may tweak here and there, stop a few KNOWN safe processes and startup apps, but we don't play with our systems for the sake of playing. We want full functionality and there's a reason most of Windows processes and services are there whether we know that reason or not.

That's fair, and I don't blame anyone for not doing what I do, whether it's for stability concerns or just because they straight up don't see the point.

I do also understand the "full functionality" point, as to be honest some things I see as "useless" might be something you'd never disable because you use it every day (think bluetooth functionality or remote access).

I'd like to think by posting here, I can avoid the Dunning-Kruger effect of thinking I know what I'm doing, messing around with system processes. I truly do not know what half of these remaining system components are used for, but maybe someone smarter than me would know and tell me "yeah that one isn't that important unless you're doing this".

zebal · Dec 20, 2023

@obfuscation
Since your computer already is good for gaming you won't have any benefit from disabling anything.
disabling services and uninstalling programs was a thing time ago when computers ran on HDD, when memory was very limited and when computers in general were limited in resources.

Today on decent computer these tweaks make not much sense, but there are still nerds who would recommend various performance tweaks.

If you want to tweak Windows and play with it tweak it for privacy and security, it will be much more fun.

zebal · Dec 20, 2023

Btw. I didn't mean to downplay anyone's suggestions with my previous post such as the one provide by @Ghot , I was rather referring to various online resource about performance tweaks which you can find, these are often too rigorous and very lengthy and out of date, doing more harm than good.

obfuscation · Dec 20, 2023

zebal said:
Since your computer already is good for gaming you won't have any benefit from disabling anything.

Yeah, I know. Three times I've said this is purely for fun. I can see that some random service I'll never need (in my usecase) is taking up 500kb of RAM and barely any cpu resources. I gain nothing from disabling that service. But I still do, because now my process count sits at one lower than I started at.

I feel like you're seeing tweaks as upgrades, things that add more functionality or performance. To me, tweaks are just customizations, they don't need a purpose if they make your Windows install feel like your own, as a bit of an FU to the direction Microsoft is taking Windows, if you will

Ghot · Dec 20, 2023

obfuscation said:
they don't need a purpose if they make your Windows install feel like your own

Windows 11 Tweaks - Leader Board.

These are tweaks I've seen asked for... many times. They are collected here for easy access. All of these and more can be found in the Eleven Forum Tutorials section. Make sure to read the "notes" in the various tutorials. At the bottom of the first post in all the "tutorials", there are...

www.elevenforum.com

zebal · Dec 20, 2023

obfuscation said:
But I still do, because now my process count sits at one lower than I started at.

Windows processes and services and their consumption of hardware resources is nothing compared to resource consumption made by software that users install, those programs which you install that are not part of Windows, aka. 3rd party software.
Things like, google drive, spotify, dropbox, VPN software and so on.

They add them self to startup programs, add firewall rules, run in background etc. etc. which combined waste more PC resources than all windows services combined.
Most importantly they also bloat your registry which is undoable.

If you want fast and stable windows, install as few programs and utilities as possible after clean install of OS.
I personally have only some 5 programs installed and don't lack anything, install only what's not already available natively in windows and your system will endure much longer and faster.

That's the tweak No.1 you can start with and then observe the difference.

obfuscation · Dec 20, 2023

zebal said:
Windows processes and services and their consumption of hardware resources is nothing compared to resource consumption made by software that users install, those

You're still stuck on this resources and performance thing, even after I explained that's not why I like doing these tweaks. I don't know what to tell you. You're right in everything you're saying but you're shadowboxing a version of myself that doesn't exist.

Pic attached is literally the only reason I do this, the peace of mind seeing this whenever I happen to check task manager gives me the same feeling you get when you customize literally anything else cosmetic, like finding the perfect wallpaper or making custom desktop environments on Linux.

It's tinkering, simple as that.

pparks1 · Dec 20, 2023

obfuscation said:
Yeah, I know. Three times I've said this is purely for fun. I can see that some random service I'll never need (in my usecase) is taking up 500kb of RAM and barely any cpu resources. I gain nothing from disabling that service. But I still do, because now my process count sits at one lower than I started at.

As long as you are having fun with it, that's all that really matters in the end.

obfuscation said:
I feel like you're seeing tweaks as upgrades, things that add more functionality or performance. To me, tweaks are just customizations, they don't need a purpose if they make your Windows install feel like your own, as a bit of an FU to the direction Microsoft is taking Windows, if you will

Myself personally, I'm not one really for tweaking and customizing everything in my system. I sort of wish that Microsoft had a "minimal" install option like many Linux distributions have, where you can start out really small with just the basics and add what you need.

My concern with making lots of tweaks is that while I can reduce a process count, or reduce memory usage, it's entirely possible that something that I run will make uses of one of those services that I have disabled and the startup at a later time would actually take longer than it would have at bootup, and thus cost me performance or time in the end.

The other concern I always have is that applications may make use of something that I don't understand or deem is unnecessary. When 3 months down the road, I install a third party app and it doesn't work as intended, it might be a real struggle to connect the dots and link it back to some service that I force uninstalled that freed up 63.4 kbytes of ram that I was certain at the time I didn't have to have.

For me on my gaming pc, the fact that it runs 100% stable, cool and quiet is the number 1 thing for me. If it's 57 processes or 72, doesn't matter as long as it's stable and playing my games well.

zebal · Dec 20, 2023

obfuscation said:
Pic attached is literally the only reason I do this, the peace of mind seeing this whenever I happen to check task manager gives me the same feeling you get when you customize literally anything else cosmetic, like finding the perfect wallpaper or making custom desktop environments on Linux.

Tweaking Linux is much easier, from your original screenshot (in your initial post) you'll have hard time to make those processes go away, sorry.

I would happily switch to Linux but I like games that run on Windows and working on Windows is easier and more appealing.
I understand you're doing it for fun.

FreeBooter · Dec 20, 2023

You can try Tiny11 What Is Tiny11 | a Lightweight Windows 11 for Download via ISO - MiniTool

obfuscation · Dec 20, 2023

zebal said:
Tweaking Linux is much easier, from your original screenshot (in your initial post) you'll have hard time to make those processes go away, sorry.

I would happily switch to Linux but I like games that run on Windows and working on Windows is easier and more appealing.
I understand you're doing it for fun.

Yeah, I've also thought about it but sadly performance definitely comes before tinkering, and the games I play run noticeably worse on Vulkan than DX11/12. Doesn't help that I'm on NVIDIA. Linux brain stuck in a Windows user body i guess

obfuscation · Dec 20, 2023

FreeBooter said:
You can try Tiny11 What Is Tiny11 | a Lightweight Windows 11 for Download via ISO - MiniTool

Thanks for the recommendation but I am already on my own custom ISO, don't really know much about Tiny11 as I've never tried it but heard mostly good things about it after they released the open source self-building script for it.

Also just FYI to anyone that reads this, never download and use custom ISOs, huge security vulnerability risks. Build them yourself with NTLite/MicroWin/MSMGToolkit/Tiny11Builder I beg you

allan · Dec 20, 2023

You know, it's your system, you seem to know what you're doing, and you've already said you're doing it just for fun. Okay, knock yourself out.

But I'd be remiss not to point out that over the years I've see more folks than you'd imagine try to pare back Windows installations for no reason other than to lessen the space used by Windows, or to delete what they think are unnecessary files/folders, or to try to speed things up by a micro millisecond, or to try to outdo my old friend Black Viper's services list - and then complain on these forums that their systems aren't working as expected (if at all LOL).

Are there files, folders, or services that aren't needed by all users? Of course there are. So what? The days of 250 Mb drives and systems with 1 Gb ram are long gone. Microsoft tells you the minimum acceptable requirements for every OS they release for a reason. If you meet those specs, you should be just fine with the OS straight out of the box. I'm a big fan of "if it ain't broke....."

Okay, rant from the new guy is over

zebal · Dec 20, 2023

obfuscation said:
Also just FYI to anyone that reads this, never download and use custom ISOs, huge security vulnerability risks. Build them yourself with NTLite/MicroWin/MSMGToolkit/Tiny11Builder I beg you

I suggest Windows ADK.
There is steep learning curve to get skillful with it, but once you master it you can customize your ISO's in great detail.

obfuscation · Dec 20, 2023

allan said:
You know, it's your system, you seem to know what you're doing, and you've already said you're doing it just for fun. Okay, knock yourself out.

But I'd be remiss not to point out that over the years I've see more folks than you'd imagine try to pare back Windows installations for no reason other than to lessen the space used by Windows, or to delete what they think are unnecessary files/folders, or to try to speed things up by a micro millisecond, or to try to outdo my old friend Black Viper's services list - and then complain on these forums that their systems aren't working as expected (if at all LOL).

Are there files, folders, or services that aren't needed by all users? Of course there are. So what? The days of 250 Mb drives and systems with 1 Gb ram are long gone. Microsoft tells you the minimum acceptable requirements for every OS they release for a reason. If you meet those specs, you should be just fine with the OS straight out of the box. I'm a big fan of "if it ain't broke....."

Okay, rant from the new guy is over

Completely valid aswell, hell I'd even argue us "form over function" people and "if it ain't broke..." people are cut from the same cloth

As to the system breakage point, yes I have had a few failures. Probably the funniest one was that Microsoft, in their infinite wisdom, made the push notification service also responsible for showing your taskbar items like the clock, background apps, and so on... You can probably imagine where this goes. It also just disappears after you disable it through regedit which is NOT how services should work haha

Nothing a system restore point couldn't fix though

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