My computer has accumulated some cruft that’s making it hard to manage, and resetting the PC seems like the most straightforward way to deal with it. I already have all my important files saved elsewhere. I also wanted to see if I could kill two birds with one stone and rid myself of the dependence on an MS account. I’ve seen there’s some terminal stuff you can do when installing Windows fresh that bypasses the mandatory account creation, but does that still work when resetting? Especially when resetting from the cloud?

And because someone is going to say “Just use Linux”, believe me, I’d love to, but the user experience sucks for literally anyone who isn’t a software developer and the accessibility has actually gotten worse over the 15 years I’ve tried to use it.

  • phanto@lemmy.ca
    41·
    10 hours ago

    Reset, once it’s done downloading (if you go cloud), pull your network cable. When it gets to “let’s get you online” hit shift f-10 which pulls up the terminal window. Type oobe\bypassnro and hit enter. Stay offline, and get back to the same spot in the install process but this time you’ll have a “I don’t have internet” link as an option. It’ll protest, but you can then move forward with a local account. I literally did it yesterday.

    Once you have a local account built, Windows will give you “sign in” alerts in settings and in security.

    Just for the record, I use Linux. I do however work in a Windows shop and understand that “just use Linux” isn’t at all helpful when someone asks a Windows question.

    • kernelle@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      31·
      2 hours ago

      BypassNRO was removed from system files in 25H2 last year, unless you happened to be served an old ISO this won’t work anymore.

      This is what I’ve been using since:

      • Complete the initial Windows 11 install and restart your PC.
      • When you reach the Secondary Keyboard Layout screen (before the Microsoft Account sign-up stage), press Shift + F10
      • In the console, type the command: start ms-cxh:localonly
      • Hit Enter, then press Escape to close the console.

      You can also use Rufus to make a setup drive which preconfigures the local account. This method and others are described in this article.

      PS: It still works if you copy the BypassNRO.cmd file from an old system to a new one when you’re in OOBE mode (Ctrl+Shift+F3) during setup. It’s just a powershell command that sets a registery key and reboots.

      • phanto@lemmy.ca
        1·
        2 hours ago

        Huh, that’s weird that I’ve been able to use the bypass NRO trick pretty consistently at work and at home… I should have mentioned the Rufus thing too, but he was doing this as a reset, not as a new install, so I didn’t.

      • Pika@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        3·
        4 hours ago

        I want to reiterate the importance of the “pull the network cable” part. If you fail to unplug the cable before the setup wizard detects that there is the possibility of a network connection, on some systems it will actually prevent you from making a local account altogether, as it will force you to connect to a network which will skip the shift-f10 step.

        We had this issue setting up demo models on laptops for awhile, if you didn’t disable the wifi adapter before it saw there was networks available(even if they were password protected) it would require a second factory reset to even get to the point where it would let you setup a local account.

        • early_riser@lemmy.worldOP
          1·
          4 hours ago

          I always disable the card in the BIOS before I do anything that requires it to be disconnected. In this case I had both an Ethernet adapter and WiFi radio. Both were disabled and I’m currently typing from my newly decrappified and locally managed system.

          Here are my exact steps:

          1. go to “reset this PC”
          2. select the cloud install
          3. select the option to erase everything
          4. wait for the installer to download. The machine will restart. In my case my Windows bootloader is broken and it tries to boot using GRUB. I haven’t figured out how to fix it including “fix boot” or whatever the recovery option is, but that’s neither here nor there. I rebooted from GRUB, went into the BIOS, and disabled all networking hardware (Ethernet and WiFi).
          5. Rebooted again (I have to manually go into the one time boot menu every time) and go into Windows. Once it gets to the “Let’s get you connected” screen, I pressed shift+F10, then entered oobe\bypassnro.
          6. The computer immediately rebooted and started the install wizard again (asking about keyboard layouts and such).
          7. On the “Let’s get you connected” screen, there was now a tiny unhighlighted option I don't have internet. I clicked it and it let me create a local account.