Microsoft Removes Group Policies From Windows 10 Pro

Megalith

Megalith

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After next week’s Anniversary Update, group policies will no longer be consistent between professional versions of W10. What this basically means is that Pro users now have less options than Enterprise or Education users. You are, for instance, out of luck if you wish to disable all Windows Store apps but are running W10 Pro.

The big one is the Turn off Microsoft consumer experiences policy. We have talked about the feature previously. It powers among other things the installation of third-party apps and extra links on Windows 10. So, if you did not want Candy Crush to be pushed to your operating system, you'd disable the policy to block that from happening. The change prevents Windows 10 Pro users from enabling the policy to block third-party application installations or links.
 
I'm sure a lot of business and commercial entities will be chiming in on this soon enough IF they even partake of this Anniversary Update, that is. This definitely does not bode well for Windows 10 in the enterprise itself for many of them considering as just noted it was there and it's now it's not.

If Microsoft intends to do such things and rip the guts out of the OS in such manners with far more frequency than in the past where years could go by before anything significant might have been changed and that was done with an entirely new (for the most part) version of Windows, the entire idea of their "rolling release" style of doing things now might just make those clients think twice about investing in it and instead just roll right over to Linux.
 
RogueTrip said:
It seems like windows 10 is getting worse by the week these days. Quite a bait and switch move for a free upgrade. I think they should get sued or forced to keep many of the features it shipped with.
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Funny thing...they are being sued already over their tactics.

thelead said:
How can they just take away a feature like this? I don't see this going well for them on the PR front.
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It is one of THE reasons for bothering with Pro over Home too.
 
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Pretty terrible. I don't see it affecting many organizations in the immediate future - but soon enough once win7 starts moving away from the majority of enterprises. For me as an individual it's bad timing since I run a 2012 r2 DC in my home, all my clients are Win10pro, and I just started recently implementing group policy objects throughout my domain as practice for my Microsoft MCSA.
 
How do you buy a product for your company and plan for its use when said product can be changed at anytime in the future, on a whim? Makes no sense to me.
 
Tiberian said:
I'm sure a lot of business and commercial entities will be chiming in on this soon enough IF they even partake of this Anniversary Update, that is. This definitely does not bode well for Windows 10 in the enterprise itself for many of them considering as just noted it was there and it's now it's not.
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Not to defend Microsoft, but businesses and commercial entities should have been buying Windows 10 Enterprise, or Windows 10 Enterprise LTSB. W10 Pro, IMO, is for individual power users.

And the only changes that I can see is that Microsoft removed a GPO that allows Pro users to disable "tips and tricks" and Windows Store suggestions. This is not exactly the end of the world.

Edit: According to this, they also removed the "do not display the lock screen" GPO. BFD.

PeaKr said:
How do you buy a product for your company and plan for its use when said product can be changed at anytime in the future, on a whim? Makes no sense to me.
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By buying the version that's specifically marked as not receiving forced feature updates, aka W10 Enterprise LTSB.
 
You should still be able to remove apps with the powershell, but who knows if that'll cause issues with windows updates. Sorry microsoft, I didn't want bundled crapware on my phone and I don't want shitware on my pc.
 
Tiberian said:
I'm sure a lot of business and commercial entities will be chiming in on this soon enough IF they even partake of this Anniversary Update, that is. This definitely does not bode well for Windows 10 in the enterprise itself for many of them considering as just noted it was there and it's now it's not.
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A lot of Enterprises are going to per-user Windows Enterprise licensing, so it won't affect them.
 
First they came for the Start Menu, and I did not speak out—
Because I did not use it.

Then they came for the Group Policies, and I did not speak out—
Because I did not care.

Then they came made Cortana mandatory, and I did not speak out—
Because I do not search.

Then they came for my documents...
 
PeaKr said:
How do you buy a product for your company and plan for its use when said product can be changed at anytime in the future, on a whim? Makes no sense to me.
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Rolling release can make things much more convenient, like on say Arch Linux...but not when done like W10 is being done.
 
It started months ago when they disabled blocking the Store on Pro.

I think the reason they are doing this is because most large business run Enterprise. Only smaller companies or home users that buy computers and leave the default installed OS are using Pro.

This also could be a ploy to get companies to buy Enterprise licensing (more revenue) since they "lost" money on the free upgrades.
 
Jim Kim said:
First they came for the Start Menu, and I did not speak out—
Because I did not use it.

Then they came for the Group Policies, and I did not speak out—
Because I did not care.

Then they came made Cortana mandatory, and I did not speak out—
Because I do not search.

Then they came for my documents...
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Reminds me of an anti flag song haha
 
Jim Kim said:
First they came for the Start Menu, and I did not speak out—
Because I did not use it.

Then they came for the Group Policies, and I did not speak out—
Because I did not care.

Then they came made Cortana mandatory, and I did not speak out—
Because I do not search.

Then they came for my documents...
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But I did use the Start menu, and did let them know I care
When I looked for group policies I could not find them there
When I saw Cortana, I wanted to kick and scream
After reading the Microsoft fine print I made sure W10 on my rig was nowhere to be seen

(sorry been reading my kid Dr Suess all morning)
 
Buy Windows 7 Pro as XP Pro EOL'd.
Upgrade to 10.
End up losing Pro features which were worth a price premium.
 
PeaKr said:
How do you buy a product for your company and plan for its use when said product can be changed at anytime in the future, on a whim? Makes no sense to me.
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This is 100% why I haven't been considering Windows 10 just yet. I can't use a system for serious work or personal projects that I know even has the potential to update without my permission and break something with no recourse, even if the odds are low.
 
When the class action lawsuit wins, put me down for 3 payments and the lawyers down for 300,000 payments.

Windows 7 was fine before they broke it. It sure as hell wasn't me that broke it.
 
That sucks for all PC users! Hopefully someone will tinker and figure out how to enable all the things MS has been disabling and locking down.
 
Well fuck, I just bought a win pro for $199 specifically and only to disable the app store and defer updates (for stability reasons).

I even chatted with ms citing this specific reason, and he still recommended the pro version 3 days ago.

I guess I can try suing in small claims courts.
 
The last time I talked about how much my co-workers and I were not looking forward to Windows 10, I was set upon by fanatical men of god for my heresy.

Looks to me like the Church done fucked up worse, so let me blaspheme again by saying fuck Windows 10 in the anus until they stop doing the same to their user base.
 
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Despotes said:
"Free" never means free. There's always political expediency.
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Yep. "If there's no strings attached, there's chains."

If MS wanted to turn Cortana back on in the update to take further advantage of technically challenged people that assumed Off meant Off in the user setting for Cortana, fine. But outright removing the GPO that lets advanced users and businesses turn off Cortana in Pro edition, that's just an outright "f- you, LOL" to their customers, and further acknowledgment of their true colors as a company that doesn't know how to innovate, and only able to compete from a monopoly or captive userbase position.
 
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Well, now I'm really glad I put 8.1 back on my machine a few days ago.

They're removing the group policy stuff in the editor but are they removing the associated entries in the registry? For years I did registry changes with Windows 7 Home Premium that did the changes you would do via GP editor with the Pro version. You may still be able to disable these 'features' via the registry.
 
Stiletto said:
The last time I talked about how much my co-workers and I were not looking forward to Windows 10, I was set upon by fanatical men of god for my heresy.

Looks to me like the Church done fucked up worse, so let me blaspheme again by saying fuck Windows 10 in the anus until they stop doing the same to their user base.
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God uses a mac.
 
I'm usually pretty easy on windows 10 because I do like it a lot, but this is horse crap. I'm not installing the anniversary update (thanks group policy) until there are workarounds or a reversal of Pro's neutering.
 
Ryun said:
I'm usually pretty easy on windows 10 because I do like it a lot, but this is horse crap. I'm not installing the anniversary update (thanks group policy) until there are workarounds or a reversal of Pro's neutering.
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You won't have a choice. I thought once it came out of insiders it was released into the wild.

Meanwhile it sure has been quiet on the "shill" side.


edit
Home users get 4 months deferment if your local draft board approves it.
How to prevent Windows 10 from installing the Anniversary Update • Pureinfotech
 
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Jim Kim said:
You won't have a choice.
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This is the short and long of it. I'm guessing there will eventually be a hacked pirate copy of 10 that disables all the telemetry and feature removal, though that won't do anything for legit users / organizations.

Meanwhile it sure has been quiet on the "shill" side.
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Yeah, I'm still trying to imagine how to spin this one. If we see any at all, my guess is it will either be a "you shouldn't need this anyway" or else "good, most users would just cause problems for system having access to this"
 
When there are no strings attached there are chains.

I am looking forward to the shills defense of this, while sitting at my gentoo box I have managed for the last 13years

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