The toolset in this repository was created to automatically apply setting referenced in white paper:
"Optimizing Windows 10, version 2004 for a Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) role"
URL: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/remote/remote-desktop-services/rds-vdi-recommendations-2004
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/wiki/contents/articles/7703.powershell-running-executables.aspx
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/microsoft.powershell.management/remove-item?view=powershell-6
https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/secguide/2016/01/21/lgpo-exe-local-group-policy-object-utility-v1-0/
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/microsoft.powershell.management/set-service?view=powershell-6
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/module/microsoft.powershell.management/remove-item?view=powershell-6
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc422938.aspx
- LGPO.EXE (available at https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=55319) stored in the 'LGPO' folder.
- Previously saved local group policy settings, available on the GitHub site where this script is located
- The PowerShell script file 'Win10_VirtualDesktop_Optimize.ps1'
- The two folders '2004' and 'LGPO'.
NOTE: This script now takes just a few minutes to complete on the reference (gold) device. The total runtime will be presented at the end, in the status output messages.
A prompt to reboot will appear when the script has comoletely finished running. Wait for this prompt to confirm the script has successfully completed.
Also, the "-verbose" parameter in PowerShell directs the script to provide descriptive output as the script is running.
- Download to the reference device, in a folder (ex. C:\Optimize), the following files: 'Win10_VirtualDesktop_Optimize.ps1'
- Download to the reference device, in a folder (ex. C:\Optimize), the following folders: '2004' 'LGPO'
- Start PowerShell elevated
- In PowerShell, change directory to the scripts folder (ex. C:\Optimize)
- Run the following PowerShell commands:
"Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned"
".\Win10_VirtualDesktop_Optimize.ps1 -WindowsVersion 2004 -Verbose - When complete, you should see a prompt to restart. You do not have to restart right away.
[NOTE] You may want to reset the PowerShell execution policy when finished, if not already set with other means
"Set-ExecutionPolicy -ExecutionPolicy Restricted"
IMPORTANT: Windows cannot check certificate information CCRL) with the following setting disabled
Local Computer Policy \ Computer Configuration \ Administrative Templates \ System \ Internet Communication Management \ Internet Communication settings
We removed this setting from the optimization toolset
Turn off Automatic Root Certificates Update
A new issue was discovered recently regarding the 'CDPSvc'. If that service is disabled, and a new user logs on to the computer then opens 'System Settings' to view display settings, 'SystemSettings.exe' will crash and log an error to the event log with code "fatal app exit". We removed the entry 'CDPSvc' from 'Win10_1909_ServicesDisable.txt' as a result.
Previously these scripts had a local policy setting at this location set to disabled:
Local Computer Policy \ Computer Configuration \ Administrative Templates \ System \ Internet Communication Management \ Internet Communication settings
Turn off Windows Network Connectivity Status Indicator active tests
With the active tests disabled, Office 365 is not able to contact it's licensing service, and therefore would not run any of the Office apps. This setting has been changed back to "Not configured" in the included LGPO file.
In some virtual environments, such as Azure Windows Virtual Desktop, some of the application windows will have no border. An example is Windows File Explorer. You can replicate this by opening Wordpad and File Explorer, then move then around and note that you may not see a border where one app starts and the other ends. One of the optimizations in the latest drop changes the Visual Effects settings (found in System Properties) to reduce animations and effects, while still maintaining a good user experience such as "smoothing screen fonts". The other two optimizations: "show shadows under mouse pointer" and "Show shadows under windows" will enable a shadow effect around the windows like File Explorer, so that the border of the app is now visible. These settings are written to the default user profile registry hive, so would apply only to users whose profile is created after these optimizations run, and on this computer.
Apps running in the background Several of the built-in UWP apps, such as Skype, Phone, and Photos, will start processes and run in the background, even though the user has not started the app(s). On a single machine this is near-zero impact, but on multi-session Windows, it can be a slightly larger impact issue. There is a setting in the 'Settings' app, under 'Background apps' that allows you to control this behavior on a per-user basis. However, there is currently no way to change this behavior as a global setting, other than to completely uninstall the app.
If you would like to keep one or more of these apps in your image, and still control the background behavior, you can edit the default user registry hive and set the following settings:
"HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\BackgroundAccessApplications\Microsoft.Windows.Photos_8wekyb3d8bbwe /v Disabled /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
"HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\BackgroundAccessApplications\Microsoft.Windows.Photos_8wekyb3d8bbwe /v DisabledByUser /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
"HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\BackgroundAccessApplications\Microsoft.SkypeApp_kzf8qxf38zg5c /v Disabled /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
"HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\BackgroundAccessApplications\Microsoft.SkypeApp_kzf8qxf38zg5c /v DisabledByUser /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
"HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\BackgroundAccessApplications\Microsoft.YourPhone_8wekyb3d8bbwe /v Disabled /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
"HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\BackgroundAccessApplications\Microsoft.YourPhone_8wekyb3d8bbwe /v DisabledByUser /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
You could also set these settings with Group Policy Preferences, and should take effect after a log off and log back on.
WINDOWS UPDATE NOT WORKING With the settings included in the LGPO backup, which is restored to the target during the processing of these scripts, if you attempt to run Windows Update manually, you may not be able to connect. This is because Feature Updates are disabled via local policy in these scripts. If you set all Windows Update policies back to "not configured", then run "GPUPDATE /force", now your machine will connect to Windows Update. The reason these settings are in place in these scripts, is in case you deploy these to a target that is Internet connected, your VM may try to "Feature Update" to the current Windows 10 build, which is termed "2004" (as of May 11, 2020). The settings in place currently, prevent Feature Updates, but also seem to inhibit just downloading monthly updates to the current build. To address this for implementations that prefer to allow Windows Update, a new "fork" of these optimization scripts has been created under the main code folder. The new folder is called "1909_WindowsUpdateEndabled". Within this folder, the local policy settings (LGPO) have all Windows Update settings "not configured". If you need to have Windows Update enabled out of the gate, try the scripts under this folder and raise an issue if any problems are found.
Disable "Inking & typing personalization" in Settings
We had removed the "OneConnect" (Mobile Plans) entry from the input file 'AppxPackages.json', because that UWP app is no longer in Windows 10, starting with 2004. However, the 2004 scripts are backward compatible with 1909, though have not been tested on any build prior to 1909. Therefore the 'OneConnect' app entry was added back to the AppxPackages.json file.
The 2004 scripts, as currently configured, pause all updates, including Quality Updates. These settings do not affect Windows Defender, which gets it updates independently. If you want to allow your target machine(s) to contact Windows Update to download and apply updates, you can change the following group policy setting either locally, or in central group policy:
Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Windows Update\Windows Update for Business\
Select when Quality Updates are received Not configured
You would also want to reset the 'Update Orchestrator' service to it's initial setting of "Automatic (Delayed Start)".
Starting with the 2004 version of these scripts, we no longer invoke the Disk Cleanup Wizard (Cleanmgr.exe). DCW is near end-of-life, but also sometimes "hangs" during running of the scripts. Instead some basic disk cleanup has been incorporated into the 'Win10_VirtualDesktop_Optimize.ps1' script. There are logs, traces, and event log files deleted. If you wish to maintain log files, you can edit the .PS1 script and remove those entries.
There have been several reports of problems with the Start Menu after applying the optimization settings, and possibly other actions. Recently we were able to reproduce a problem with the Start Menu by performing a Feature Update from 1909 to 2004, where the 1909 session host had the optimization settings in place. The problem could arise as the result of having "optimized" user profiles, either locally or in a profile solution such as FSLogix. Then the Feature Update process does some work with Appx packages during that process, leading to orphaned items in the user's Start Menu.
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Create a script to repair the Start Menu, by copying the following to a text file, saving that as a .CMD or .BAT file, then providing that to the affected user either interactively or a logon script (normally does not require elevation).
start /wait taskkill /IM StartMenuExperienceHost.exe /F rd /S /Q "%UserProfile%\Appdata\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\AC" rd /S /Q "%UserProfile%\Appdata\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\AppData" rd /S /Q "%UserProfile%\Appdata\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\LocalCache" rd /S /Q "%UserProfile%\Appdata\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\LocalState" rd /S /Q "%UserProfile%\Appdata\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\RoamingState" rd /S /Q "%UserProfile%\Appdata\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\Settings" rd /S /Q "%UserProfile%\Appdata\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\SystemAppData" rd /S /Q "%UserProfile%\Appdata\Local\Packages\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\TempState" Start C:\Windows\SystemApps\Microsoft.Windows.StartMenuExperienceHost_cw5n1h2txyewy\StartMenuExperienceHost.exe -
Re-run the optimization toolset, with the appropriate '-WindowsVersion' parameter (e.g. 2004).
[NOTE] Not only will this repair the Start Menu in some cases, there are a few settings that are specific to the specific build that may not have been previously applied.
There is a default setting for OneDrive set in this tool, with these details:
Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Windows Components\OneDrive
"Prevent OneDrive from generating network traffic until the user signs in to OneDrive"
Default state: Not Configured
Optimization tool state: Enabled
There was another issue related to this setting also reported recently. Some of the Office apps would "hang" for several or more seconds, until OneDrive sync was complete. This could be related to this setting. Therefore, we are going to revert this setting, in this tool, to the default state of "not configured".
This particular policy setting is actually a preference. You can confirm this by noting the "down arrow" overlay on the setting icon. A good way to revert the setting would be to change the setting back to default with group policy. If you had to do this for each user, the process could be more involved.
If you find that you have removed and appx package and now need it back, the easiest way is to either open up the Microsoft Store app and search for the application, or open up the AppxPackages.json file, search for the application, and follow the link provided in the URL section. In order to install this though, you might need to re-enable the InstallService "Microsoft Store install service" or you might get an error when trying to reinstall.
There may be times when you download this script and it is tagged as being dowlowed from the internet, and thus being blocked from running. In order to all this script to be run you may have to run Unblock-File to remove this stream.
From the PowerShell Documentation -The Unblock-File cmdlet lets you open files that were downloaded from the Internet. It unblocks PowerShell script files that were downloaded from the Internet so you can run them, even when the PowerShell execution policy is RemoteSigned. By default, these files are blocked to protect the computer from untrusted files.
Before using the Unblock-File cmdlet, review the file and its source and verify that it is safe to open.
Internally, the Unblock-File cmdlet removes the Zone.Identifier alternate data stream, which has a value of "3" to indicate that it was downloaded from the Internet.
More information about Unblock-File can be found here: Unblock-File
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