The Slippery Soapbox

[Fogdude]

Several days ago, I got a phone call from my 88 year old father. He wasn't able to run his Skype & call me with it. He said his screen looked 'funny' & none of his normal programs, menus or screens were available & his screen was full of a lot of 'boxes'.

After a great deal of coaching & guiding, being completely in the blind & having no idea what he was trying to describe to me, I got him into a menu, found his Skype & got it running. Once I got with him on Skype, I had him show me his screen. What I saw was nothing I'd ever seen before. It was a bit like the old Metro screen from Windows 8, but this is Win10 & even the start button on the Task Bar wasn't behaving normally. The notification area had none of the usual icons, most of the added security software I had installed for him was gone & instead, he had a tiled interface that didn't list much, if any, of what he'd had installed.

I was able to get him to the RUN option & do a Winver, which told me he has a Win10 Anniversary version that has a higher number than the one I currently have. It appears he got an update. He'd already gotten the anniversary update, so this was an update to that. Expected, of course. Windows will always be updating when MSFT decides they want to, but I'd never seen an update do something like this to a stable system.

After several hours of guiding him through checking every option I could think of, & every setting was as it should have been. He's using a local account & was successfully logged in, so it wasn't an issue of logging in with the wrong account.

I told him I'd have to do some research & get back to him. As soon as I hung up, an idea came to me, so I googled "Change Tablet Mode to Desktop Mode"  & BANG! That was it.

I called him back on Skype, went into Settings, System, Tablet Mode & set it to USE DESKTOP MODE (for When I sign in) & DON"t ASK ME AND DON'T SWITCH (for When this device automatically switches tablet mode on or off)

I also had him turn OFF the option to Hide app icons on the taskbar in tablet mode & also turn OFF the option to Automatically hide the taskbar when in tablet mode, just in case he ever got back into that mode.

I have no definitive idea why this update decided to switch his mode this way. He has two laptops. Both got the update, but only one went haywire this way. They aren't identical, so there must be something about the physical attributes of this one that made the update think it needed to be treated as a tablet.

Anyway, I just thought I'd throw it out there in case any of you, or those you help with such things, see this & are as confused by it as I initially was.

[VincentLupo]

Good job figuring it out Fog.

[ctaulbee]

Typical Microsoft behavior, it would be really hard for them to shock me with their antics as I have really accepted the fact they can and will do anything with no warning.

[2getted]

Try using a laptop that can convert to stand mode and tablet mode. Windows 10 just loves trying different layouts to what it thinks you want.

Could be worse though - it could have tried a mobile phone mode.

[Fogdude]

I've now force updated 4 more laptops. Two of them are identical models to the one my father had this happen to him on. NONE of them had a blip of a problem. When I say identical, I mean the EXACT same hardware, the same configuration & the same basis system settings. Even the same attached hardware, except he is using external USB touch pads instead of mice. This is so both his laptops have the same input device that works the same way & he can't accidentally press the mouse buttons. Since only one of his laptops had this issue, I discounted the touch pads & I don't have external touch pads on any of mine.

On another note, I have noticed that all my updated systems now restart much faster & Windows loads the desktop MUCH faster than ever before. I still have one more laptop to update. That one is always an issue, so it'll be interesting to see how that one goes.

[2getted]

I wonder if the external touch pad was being used or being accessed at the time of the update. Windows might have seen the touch pad as indicating a tablet mode was being used and then decided that this mode must be what you should be using.

[Fogdude]

I wonder if the external touch pad was being used or being accessed at the time of the update. Windows might have seen the touch pad as indicating a tablet mode was being used and then decided that this mode must be what you should be using.

That did occur to me. In fact, the touchpads were my first thought, though since only one machine was affected your point is well taken. It's the only thing that remotely makes sense, but there's no way to tell for sure, at this point. I'm just chalking this one up to experience.

[Fogdude]

Well, I decided to go ahead & install the Creator's Update (1703) on a laptop I'm setting up for a friend. It went fairly quickly & smoothly, so I'm going to test it out on one of my less used machines soon. I have Cortana totally disabled on all mine. It will be interesting to see if it gets reinstated with this update. I suspect it will, as this newest version seems to be pushing the whole Cortana thing even more than earlier ones. It took awhile to figure out how to kill Cortana the last time. I hope the same method still works.... we'll see.

[Fogdude]

I did the Creator's Update (1703) last night, on one of my lesser used laptops. It was quite uneventful, though it took almost 2 hours. It's the most intrusive update, so far, reinstating many services & background processes I had disabled or removed, before. It also, as I predicted, reinstated Cortana. Luckily, the same technique for killing Cortana still works, so that is already out of the picture. It also insists on running Windows Defender & no longer provides a straightforward way to disable it. However, the service can be disabled. It also removed some of the spyware software I had installed, but every Windows Update, major & minor, has done this. They are very aggressive about killing off SpyBot Search & Destroy. It is completely removed from the system, though the Programs & Features entry is always left, which must be removed manually. Reinstalling Spybot always goes flawlessly & it works fine. There must be something very effective about SpyBot that they really don't like, which tells me, all the more, that I should continue to reinstate it.

[Fogdude]

I have now completed the Creators's Update (1703) on 5 of my 6 machines. No events, no unexpected turns. It takes about 3 hours, on my systems & requires a couple of interactions with multiple reboots. My technique for disabling Cortana is still valid & has worked in every instance. There are a number of new intrusions I'm still working on. Namely, Windows Defender & the Firewall, which this update does seem to turn on, by default, though it didn't turn on the firewall in every case. It did uninstall the Spybot S&D in 4 of the 5 I've done so far, but reinstalls work fine. I also use Classic Shell, which does its own reconfig, once you log in after the final updates. There are MANY new services & background tasks running now, but the performance impact is low. I'll find what I can about those & if there are reasonable corrective actions, I'll update.

Overall, since Cortana can still be virtually eliminated, I see no reason not to go ahead with this update... yet.

[ctaulbee]

There are MANY new services & background tasks running now, but the performance impact is low. I'll find what I can about those & if there are reasonable corrective actions, I'll update.

A lot of those background tasks are just new apps, that get set to auto run for 3D stuff, easiest way to get rid of those, as they do eat up memory and some clock cycles, is to just uninstall the app, if they are ever needed windows will tell you and it's couple of clicks to re-install them, That's what I did, I removed several of those.

[Fogdude]

Very good point, CT. Thanks for bringing that up.

As to services, processes & apps that can be stopped, disabled or removed, I will point everyone to a guy whose advice I have followed for almost 25 years. He goes by the name Black Viper & he has a web site where he publishes lists of Windows services for each major version. He provides charts of everything, what is safe & not safe to eliminate & how to do it. I highly recommend his site. I can't publish a link here, but you'll find him easily enough just by googling his name.

[Fogdude]

Another little update:

When I sat down at the keyboard today, I found that I couldn't run Task Manager, Services or an elevated privileges Command prompt. Each reported they were unable to receive command messages at this time. Googling this, I found that a restart will oftne correct it, but a SFC scan should be done. So, I rebooted & sure enough, the problem appeared to be corrected, but I went ahead & did the SFC /scannow from an elevated command prompt.

Guess what? Yep, Cortana was reinstated. Interestingly, the repair simply duplicated the original Cortana directory, 'random' characters & all, with only the added characters I had edited it with, to hide it. Apparently, those characters aren't really random, at all. So, I now had two Cortana directories. One with the normal name & one with the added XXX. I went through the same process to hide it again & it's all working as before. Apparently, MSFT has discovered there are some of us disabling their tattletale & have tied it to some other services, so if it stops working, it eventually stops other, more important to us, services from working, too.

Naturally, if I discover anything else of note, I'll report it.

[ctaulbee]

I think it's safe to say they have internet access in Cortana's motherland.

   

[ctaulbee]

On a more serious note I just got a new update few days back, this was a minor update as I have had the creators update for awhile.

I don't know which one it was or what it was suppose to fix as there were a few things that started misbehaving, that seems to always happen after a big update, it fixed all that but it broke my sound completely as in none, nada, nothing.

Like a silly little boy I let the windows troubleshooter look it over, it reported that it had found the problem and could correct it.

So blindly without asking it to show me "more info" I clicked the big green fix it button and regretted it before the click sound had ended, as I instantly realized I was clueless as to what it was about to do...

Oh it fixed it alright, I got sound back, well "Microsoft sound" they uninstalled my factory hardware driver completely and installed a MS version with near zero features that I am used to... yeah little pissed off about that.

There was no rollback option, no way to undo this quandary, so I ended up going to the factory site to get the real driver.

Since I was running in traffic with blinders on anyway, I just left the brain disengaged and charged ahead clicking a internal shortcut that is part of the factory stuff to get to the support site.

Now this is where the blinders come in, I never noticed it opened the site in Edge without asking me... and no it is not the default browser...

Good news though, they had one that would have fixed my problem I'm sure from the jump, I know this because it was labeled "corrects the W10 update where you lose sound" duh...

It just keeps getting better.

Turns out this is a huge install took 15mins to get to 97.8% downloaded and froze, that was when I realized Edge was running, so junked that and for some reason it keep restarting Edge and messing up the screen, I'm guessing because the download was trying to resume as it was a factory triggered deal???

Anyway finally just killed it by declining to let it resume lol.

I'm even more pissed now.

Partially engaged the brain and looked up the damn support link on google myself and went there in Ice Dragon, then downloaded the package with no problems.

Took 30 mins to unpack and install this beast and a restart of course...

Didn't work, I'm really pissed off now.

Then I read the instructions...

Followed them, boom 30 mins later all good, everything back as it was and working fine.

I hate instructions...

[Wrench]

Murphys law when all else fails read the instructions

[chouette]

OMG CT, that sounds like something I could have never had figured out...  

Glad you had it all sorted out because who would do those tutorials huh? WHO???  

OK that was pretty selfish of me because I'm in dire need of them, lol - But seriously, I'm always worried when Windows has an update because lately, you never know what it will affect or how it will turn out. I hate instructions as well, especially theirs.

[ctaulbee]

Yup there is nothing quite as satisfying as banging your head on a wall a few times in quick succession.

[Fogdude]

Boy, do I know that one! Had a Windows Update (back in 8.1) that eliminated my WiFi completely. Turned out, they had replaced the factory driver with their own, which didn't work at all. Had to go into the update history & revert it back to the previous driver. It was simple & it worked just fine, but it was tricky figuring out just which one was the one that would work.

This is the biggest problem I have with Win10, aside from the incredibly invasive privacy intrusions, the forced updating. I have NEVER allowed automatic updates, until Win10. I only tolerate it because I'm getting to old to fight the trend. So far, I've been lucky. Overall, Win10 has fixed more things than it's broken, so I'm breathing easier about it, especially knowing I can kill that little tattletale, Cortana.

[ctaulbee]

Yup that is how I got sucked in on this, W10 has been so good at not messing up things that I had let my guard down to the point of trusting it lmao.

This is the first time it has broken anything of that nature and while it was my fault really and it does not surprise me that the fix was what it was, after all we know their ultimate goal is to "Make The World Microsoft" anyway so a person should always be looking for things like that to happen lol.

[ctaulbee]

New windows update came today along with what has become a regular occurrence, a little surprise offer...

latest.jpg (98.09 KiB) Viewed 2904 times

Now since Foggy is so chummy with Cortana I'm guessing he has already acquired this new app and can give us the lowdown on how great it is...

[Fogdude]

I don't even do FaceBook n my phone! I don't even have Cortana running on any of my systems. Not likely I'd be downloading their stupid app to crap up my phone even more!

This actually made me laugh out loud, Curt!

[ctaulbee]

I figured you would appreciate the humor of that little prod

[chouette]

Too funny!

[Fogdude]

As anyone who has followed this thread knows I have almost totally disabled Cortana & stopped its spying activities on ALL my systems, with the only downside (for some of you... I see it as a bonus) being that you also lose the search feature & voice input.

The only symptom I have found that it is not completely dead is that there is still a component I haven't been able to isolate that attempts to start Cortana every time I restart Windows. I find this reassuring & nominally expected, though I'd prefer to locate the source & stop it there. The evidence of this is in the Windows System Event log errors 1001. Since this only happens during restart, it's not problematic at all & has no impact on performance I can detect.

Since I use Skype & since MSFT has decided to tie much of their tattling Cortana to popular services & apps, I have found I can no longer send video or audio messages in Skype, though normal video & audio sessions & sending files, etc., work fine & show no ill effects. I can't prove that Cortana is the source of this problem, but I believe it's likely. I am not about to enable Cortana, just to check on it, though if a future Windows Update re-enables Cortana, as they sometimes do, I will definitely test this theory & report back.