I know that sounds like the start of a pitting, but it’s really a question. I’m helping my mother pick out a new desktop PC, but my own house is basically a collection of MacBooks and mobile devices, so it’s been a while since I shopped for something like this. I do however have this vague memory of Norton and a million other apps coming with PCs and making me crazy back in the day.
(Before you ask why I don’t talk her into a MacBook, she’s 82 and likes the desktop tower, so get the heck off my lawn. )
Of course, maybe it’s not a problem anymore. Or maybe someone has a magical tool that scrapes all that crap away.
If you have a Microsoft store near you they sell “Signature” pcs with no crap on them (online as well). I’ll either buy directly from Microsoft or a from someone who built a pc for me from now on.
If you do get a machine filled with bloatware, the only surefire solution is to simply reformat and reinstall the operating system from scratch before you bother to do a single other thing with it. You will definitely get a clean installation then. Maybe a bit too clean, when it comes to drivers!
IME Windows is getting better and better about automatically installing drivers that Just Work. In the last few clean installs I’ve done, I’ve only hand to manually install drivers in a handful of cases: to get the latest graphics driver which has been optimized for a newly released game, or to enable some obscure function on an old motherboard. On a new PC even that may be unnecessary.
To do that, you need a clean install disc and few PCs if any come with a Windows 7/8/10 disc.
The restore partition is simply the original install including the bloatware.
You can download an official Windows installer for Windows 8 and Windows 10 easily enough. (Also for Windows 7, but last time I did that they had some extra hoops to jump through). Just need a 4 gb USB thumb drive.
The Microsoft Signature image has no crapware, has been optimized, passes all sorts of technical tests, don’t give exceptions to the tests, etc. It’s a clean robust image on a tuned PC. I’ll never buy a PC outside of the store again.
I’ve been told that there will be a new Signature program coming out where the PC passes the high standards but isn’t sold in the MS Store.
I used to work at MSFT and have been involved in the Signature image process and heartily recommend it.
First, thanks to everyone for chiming in! (sorry it took so long to respond)
This! Thanks for this, I found the one she wanted here for $60 less than what Best Buy wanted, and sent her the link!
Of course, a couple of days later she bought it from Best Buy anyway saying she was ‘more comfortable’ with them, and my son and I went over to set it up. For the record, it has so far had less bloatware than I was expecting. (but it was still $60 more than she should have paid)
It’s generally not too hard to uninstall the bloatware now. I’d take off anything like those free to play games and at least disable anything that starts up on boot.
Do these Microsoft stores sell any true laptops? A Surface is not a laptop because it doesn’t really go on your lap easily. The nearest MS store to me is 350 miles away.
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