Microsoft to Remove Ability to Install Win 11 Pro Without Being Online and Signing in to Microsoft Account

schoolslave said:
Still not nearly as bad as the "stick your head up Microsoft's butthole so far that you can see the cloud(s)" approach.
Click to expand...

Pretty witty. I don't have a single computer that uses a Microsoft Account, and I haven't paid Microsoft a single dollar since the 20th Century, but I guess in your mind if you're not bashing Microsoft then you must be a fanboy?

If you look at our posting histories, I think it's pretty clear which one of us has been trying to help people and share our hands-on experiences with Windows vs which one of us thinks they are a badass for insulting people.
 
ManofGod said:
Well, the case in point has been proven then, you data is forfeit if you are using Windows 10 or 11 at home, since you are not an Enterprise and do not have an Enterprise account.
Click to expand...
What data??? You can turn off all tracking metrics on Windows 10 and 11 Home edition and up. What do you specifically think Microsoft is tracking?
 
Lakados said:
What data??? You can turn off all tracking metrics on Windows 10 and 11 Home edition and up. What do you specifically think Microsoft is tracking?
Click to expand...
My PiHole blocks all sorts of attempts whereby Windows tries to phone home, no matter what I do in relation to registry settings or GPO settings. Due to the fact the data is encrypted, I have no idea just what these packets contain; how is it you're privy to such information?

Or are you just assuming Microsoft are your friend?
 
GotNoRice said:
It's not a loophole. There are businesses where you literally aren't allowed to use something like a Microsoft account even if you wanted to, purely for security reasons. Also consider from the system builder perspective. In 99% of cases a system builder would not have the information to log in to their end customer's Microsoft account while building and configuring the system. There will always have to be a way to get Windows onto the computer, so that computer can be completed and then given to the end customer, after which they can potentially log in using their Microsoft Account if they wanted.
Click to expand...
Most people will make a account or log into one when they are setting up. When I brought my windows 10 laptop it booted up into the finalizing prompts that asks you all the dumb questions and asks to create a MS account. It was easily skipped but most average users will just make one thinking they need too.
 
Red Falcon said:
If the product is free, you are the product.
Click to expand...
Only in the case of modern corporatism; and if I'm going to be the product, they can either pay me for that personal metadata they on sell to advertisers, or they can bash their OS up their orifice.

Luckily there are alternatives that are truly free. Made by the people for the people.
 
Mazzspeed said:
My PiHole blocks all sorts of attempts whereby Windows tries to phone home, no matter what I do in relation to registry settings or GPO settings. Due to the fact the data is encrypted, I have no idea just what these packets contain; how is it you're privy to such information?

Or are you just assuming Microsoft are your friend?
Click to expand...
Look what’s actually in them, it’s nothing.
Microsoft does have a tool that lets you see the contents. It’s basically just update statuses and the warnings and errors located in the event logs.

And if the system is sending them out then you didn’t disable them.

Unless you are using Edge, that transmits back a fair bit, but still less than Chrome, slightly more than Firefox.
 
Last edited:
Wat said:
Yeah, but I fail to see how any corporation could extract enough value from me to make it all worthwhile. Im a dïck
Click to expand...
Self admission of being "a dick". 20 points off your Social Credit Score!
 
Lakados said:
Look what’s actually in them, it’s nothing.
Microsoft does have a tool that lets you see the contents. It’s basically just update statuses and the warnings and errors located in the event logs.
Click to expand...
Have you got a link to this tool? I struggle to see how I can view all telemetry sent back to MS when I really only have Microsoft's word on where all telemetry is actually stored before being sent out. I don't even know if the tool is decrypting the whole packet or just the parts MS allow me to see.

EDIT: Found the tool here:

https://www.ghacks.net/2018/01/24/view-telemetry-data-windows-10/

This comment is interesting:

While you do get a listing of variables and data, for the most part, it is sometimes unclear what that data means. For instance, what does "Gyroscope : 7", "epoch: "1102666", or "iKey:" mean exactly?
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
Mazzspeed said:
Have you got a link to this tool? I struggle to see how I can view all telemetry sent back to MS when I really only have Microsoft's word on where all telemetry is actually stored before being sent out. I don't even know if the tool is decrypting the whole packet or just the parts MS allow me to see.

EDIT: Found the tool here:

https://www.ghacks.net/2018/01/24/view-telemetry-data-windows-10/

This comment is interesting:
Click to expand...
Gyroscope is part of the Census.Hardware flag and indicates whether the device has a gyroscope.
Epoch is a generic counter, it could be simply how many times this event has occurred since the logging started to how many times a specific action was triggered. That one depends on the context.
iKey represents an ID for applications or other logical groupings of events

For a full list of the different flags, Microsoft maintains a full list of them under their privacy section in their documents. From there you can also find the release builds for Windows 10 as well.
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/privacy/required-windows-11-diagnostic-events-and-fields
 
Mazzspeed said:
Oh I disabled them, it's not rocket science.
Click to expand...
I don't know they buried a good number of those bastards pretty deep in the registry under names you don't expect, I would need to do a deep dive on my GPs to find them all because they change them with each build it seems and I have done a shit job at documenting them as I add them.
 
Not really a thread derailer, just makes me look dumb. Can I decouple myself from logging into a microsoft account when I upgrade to 11 or do I need to do a clean install? Also can you all let go of your weird internet pride and say if this topic is bullshit or not. Not everything has to be an argument.
 
Lakados said:
Look what’s actually in them, it’s nothing.

Unless you are using Edge, that transmits back a fair bit, but still less than Chrome, slightly more than Firefox.
Click to expand...
There was also the report of Edge automatically sync'ng bookmarks and other data to Microsoft by default without informed consent merely if one was logged into a non-local Windows account.

Microsoft used its position of users being logged into their accounts at the OS level to make this easier than the behavior of browsers where a user has to first opt-in to such sync via a separate login (not sure if Apple does such a thing by default with Safari on macOS). Additionally there are are user reports of sync being re-enabled, if manually disabled, following an update.
 
Last edited:
Smoked Brisket said:
Not really a thread derailer, just makes me look dumb. Can I decouple myself from logging into a microsoft account when I upgrade to 11 or do I need to do a clean install? Also can you all let go of your weird internet pride and say if this topic is bullshit or not. Not everything has to be an argument.
Click to expand...
This change to the pro version is only on a preview build at this point and with the backlash I doubt it will make it to the mainstream version, the main internet squabble above was about a possible workaround and whether that absolved MS of being a dick pushing online accounts. So to answer your question in short, yes you can install win 11 pro right now with a local account only but the question is whether that will change. Honestly it sounds like theirs a good argument for them not to change the workaround since it affects corporate users which they do care about not pissing off but I don't see why they couldn't just further segment those functions off to volume license versions only.

MS is clearly pushing for online accounts since w10 and has been embedding their telemetry deeper while adding new undocumented IPs like crazy so I don't trust them or their tool since it was released only after outcry over the sheer amount of data being transferred and from what I've read still doesn't explain large amounts of the data being sent unless MS is doing the opposite of compression and adding tons of fluff, it is MS so you can't rule out incompetence but coupled with their push for online accounts and browser I'm skeptical that it isn't intentional and malicious(self serving).

I plan to stick with my somewhat locked down and neutered version of 10 for now and try some flavor of *nix again before 10 loses support but I suspect that it will be better than the last couple times I tried it but will still fall a little short for gaming.
 
I think you would need a Windows 11 disc before all of this. Just tried updating my computer and there was no way to get around Microsoft account setup by online upgrade.

This really isn't a big deal for me. I've been using Linux for a while. Gaming on Linux has come a long way. I was able to even play God of war on Linux without issue. The only thing Linux lacks compared to Windows right now is HDR support which apparently is coming. So I'm not all that worried.
 
Ebernanut said:
This change to the pro version is only on a preview build at this point and with the backlash I doubt it will make it to the mainstream version, the main internet squabble above was about a possible workaround and whether that absolved MS of being a dick pushing online accounts. So to answer your question in short, yes you can install win 11 pro right now with a local account only but the question is whether that will change. Honestly it sounds like theirs a good argument for them not to change the workaround since it affects corporate users which they do care about not pissing off but I don't see why they couldn't just further segment those functions off to volume license versions only.
Click to expand...
As I said previously: buy a physical copy (or download an ISO) of the original version now, and just make sure you're not online when you run an install in the future. Bang, you get your local account.
 
1_rick said:
As I said previously: buy a physical copy (or download an ISO) of the original version now, and just make sure you're not online when you run an install in the future. Bang, you get your local account.
Click to expand...
You realize they update the ISO, meaning they also update the out of the box OOBE? Sure, you may buy old stock, but that's not going to last forever. Furthermore, Microsoft will still hound you with a full screen requester asking you to switch to a Microsoft account with the only two options being 'remind me in another 3 days' and 'switch now'' in order to close the full screen requester.
 
Mazzspeed said:
You realize they update the ISO
Click to expand...
Obviously you would have to do this before they update the ISO or the flash drives. I'm pretty sure I said that the first time I mentioned it upthread. I never said I had a panacea. Also, we've been around the OOBE thing endlessly, so I'm just going to remind you again that I said "make sure you're not online". Again. You even quoted me.

This is exactly how I installed Windows 11 Pro, and it hasn't asked me yet to downgrade to an MSA since I ran the installer.

You keep raging about the imaginary lack of workarounds, though.
 
Haha all this bickering, I'd be really surprised if there was even any difference between a local and Microsoft account these days. Maybe back in windows 7-8 there was, but nowadays... I'm not naive enough to believe that I'll be circumventing all tracking and identification by using a local account in an OS that is online all the time
 
blackmomba said:
Haha all this bickering, I'd be really surprised if there was even any difference between a local and Microsoft account these days. Maybe back in windows 7-8 there was, but nowadays... I'm not naive enough to believe that I'll be circumventing all tracking and identification by using a local account in an OS that is online all the time
Click to expand...
There really isn't but I can tell you from an administrative perspective, I can crack a local account pretty easily, I get brought those all the time after somebody changed the local password and forgot it. It's not a complicated process, but I certainly cant crack the online accounts, have had more than one of our older bus drivers bring their laptops to me being all "kids set this up and it was just a 4 digit pin code but now I can't remember it"

And yeah I know we are all like dude it's 4 digits, but I mean how many of us have forgotten the pin on our Credit Cards... I mean not me of course not that would be silly its only 4 digits ...

But yeah had to go through the full Microsoft reset process for that and sweet Jesus that wasn't that fun especially when they also don't remember the answers to their security questions, and they no longer have the phone number that the account was registered to because for some ungodly reason they entered their landline number for the security confirmation because they didn't want to give out their cell phone number. Yeah, those have been some jobs, eventually just call up their kids and be like, hey you know the password, and they basically go "yeah he logged into his amazon account one time on my computer probably saved the password too, let me check, yeah for Amazon they used this so try that", and BAM in we get in!
 
Lakados said:
There really isn't but I can tell you from an administrative perspective, I can crack a local account pretty easily, I get brought those all the time after somebody changed the local password and forgot it. It's not a complicated process, but I certainly cant crack the online accounts, have had more than one of our older bus drivers bring their laptops to me being all "kids set this up and it was just a 4 digit pin code but now I can't remember it"
Click to expand...
Of course, the irony of this comment is the Windows, iOS and Android users that claim they have nothing to hide so they may as well leave the faceless corporate overlords have full access to their data....

If that's the case, why the need for the added (manipulated) requirement of Microsoft accounts and encryption on a PC that's never leaves the house? As someone that also deals with the administration of personal machines, I can assure anyone out there that if you somehow loose the credentials to your Microsoft account and don't know the answers to those security questions to the letter, not to mention the situation where your account is phished and the login credentials changed - Microsoft simply aren't interested; if you aren't paying for Microsoft 365 Online you will never get that account back again.
 
Good to be aware of. I'll make sure to create a couple of install USBs before the change is incorporated in the install files.
 
The_Heretic said:
Good to be aware of. I'll make sure to create a couple of install USBs before the change is incorporated in the install files.
Click to expand...

BTW, in case you haven't actually been following the entire thread. There are no versions of Windows 11 Pro that currently exist (including all Dev, Beta, and and Release Preview builds) that prevent you from creating a local account, nor is there any actual evidence that they will ever fully remove that option.
 
Also, I just did a fresh install of the very latest Dev build (22567.1, newer than the build discussed in the original article), and in addition to the ability to use the Domain Join option to create a local account, the normal option to create an Offline Account during "Set up for personal use" is right there also. Internet was connected during the install.

Remind me again what people are getting angsty about?

Win11Dev1.jpg


Win11Dev2.jpg


Win11Dev3.jpg


Win11Dev4.jpg


Win11Dev5.jpg
 
I'm more annoyed that Win11 is just a weird thing in general.

Normally you'd want people clamoring for your new release, not thinking "well, no thanks I guess."
 
OutOfPhase said:
I'm more annoyed that Win11 is just a weird thing in general.

Normally you'd want people clamoring for your new release, not thinking "well, no thanks I guess."
Click to expand...
for "us" yeah i can see that but the average consumers dont care as long as the see the icons they recognize and it comes on all the new stuff so theyll use it anyways.
 
1_rick said:
Home or Pro?
Click to expand...

Yes, Pro. My bad for not specifying. I pretty much only use and test Pro. I don't touch Home unless I have a very specific reason to do so. Even if I get a computer that comes with Home, I usually wipe it immediately and install Pro.
 
GotNoRice said:
Yes, Pro. My bad for not specifying. I pretty much only use and test Pro. I don't touch Home unless I have a very specific reason to do so. Even if I get a computer that comes with Home, I usually wipe it immediately and install Pro.
Click to expand...
I don't think people thought Pro would have it. There's no way any business could use it if it didn't have local accounts.
 
kac77 said:
I don't think people thought Pro would have it. There's no way any business could use it if it didn't have local accounts.
Click to expand...
sure they would, if they use ms based accounts, ad or whatever its called like at my work. we could sign in anywhere with our school accounts. but they arent going to turf it for those that dont.
 
kac77 said:
I don't think people thought Pro would have it. There's no way any business could use it if it didn't have local accounts.
Click to expand...
Yes and no, here it gets a little harder. If you are a business and you are running Office 365 and Azure Active Directory you now have basically turned your work email accounts into Microsoft accounts. With this those Microsoft accounts it asks for could be just one of your company email accounts. I do know that works as more than once I’ve been setting up a personal computer for the wife or parents fell into my work routine and just entered my domain admin credentials and popped in right from the installer.

That said the local account is easiest for large enterprises or places not using O365 & AAD, but large enterprise have Enterprise licenses and those have a different installer completely.
 
Lakados said:
Yes and no, here it gets a little harder. If you are a business and you are running Office 365 and Azure Active Directory you now have basically turned your work email accounts into Microsoft accounts. With this those Microsoft accounts it asks for could be just one of your company email accounts. I do know that works as more than once I’ve been setting up a personal computer for the wife or parents fell into my work routine and just entered my domain admin credentials and popped in right from the installer.

That said the local account is easiest for large enterprises or places not using O365 & AAD, but large enterprise have Enterprise licenses and those have a different installer completely.
Click to expand...
thats what we were using. seemed to work good to me.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top