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Post by rn10950 on Jan 10, 2018 22:50:49 GMT -8
I recently learned that the newer versions of Windows Server have an installation option that will only install the basic system and a command prompt, kind of like the Windows 7 recovery environment. I thought it would be an interesting thing to try out and attempt to build a Windows Classic interface on top of. I got close after just a few hours of experimenting. This is pretty much a proof of concept at this point:  WindowsClassicA works fine, deskn.cpl also runs almost perfectly, something that I have not had much luck with desktop Windows 10. ReactOS shell also works surprisingly well, the Start Menu works, as well as the taskbar when run from a CMD window or batch file. (I have 2 batch files: system startup and user login. The system startup one has the classic theme executable in it and the user logon one has the ROS shell.) I use Explorer++ as my file manager (something I use in all versions newer than XP) The LogonUI command line login program is the default login program, so essentially DWM isn't necessary on this system at all. There are a few roadblocks and things that don't work however, I'm sure some of these could be looked into finding a way to fix: - The Marlett font isn't included for some reason, so the Classic theme couldn't display min/max/close buttons. This could easily be fixed by dropping in marlett.ttf from XP.
- Obviously, Explorer is not in this system at all, so most CPLs are not included. This makes changing something as simple as environment variables or the screen resolution difficult.
- MMC is also not included, which makes changing group policy settings difficult (something you need to do to enable the boot/logon scripts. I had to connect to it from the VM's host computer)
- Firefox can't find XPCOM and doesn't start (SeaMonkey works fine) This may be from a missing DLL, I have to look into it further.
- Some start menu items don't work, but I assume that the ROS shell could be modified to make them work (did not try Classic Shell, that may work as well)
- Reorganizing the toolbar in SeaMonkey also doesn't work, may also have something to do with missing DLL.
This may have potential in being an interesting starting point to base a whole new shell off of.
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Post by R.O.B. on Jan 13, 2018 15:24:47 GMT -8
That looks really interesting. I'll see if I have the chance to experiment with this myself soon.
We should definitely look into getting things like Firefox to run though.
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Post by rn10950 on Jan 15, 2018 23:24:22 GMT -8
That looks really interesting. I'll see if I have the chance to experiment with this myself soon. We should definitely look into getting things like Firefox to run though. Got Firefox and Chrome to run:  The issue with Firefox was no DirectX (I have no idea why SM ran and not FF) but you can install a limited subset of DX (enough for this to work) by running this from PowerShell: Install-WindowsFeature Server-Media-Foundation -IncludeAllSubFeature
~~ and ~~
Add-WindowsCapability -Name "Tools.Graphics.DirectX~~~~0.0.1.0" -Online -LimitAccess -Source "C:\Windows\winsxs"
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Post by zero3k on Feb 15, 2018 19:25:11 GMT -8
Any updates regarding this? How would a normal user go about switching from the Windows 10 Shell to this?
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Post by Aesthetic Classic on May 16, 2018 3:28:26 GMT -8
Since Windows Server Core isn't intended to be used as a regular desktop OS which is why it's a minimal operating system that doesn't rely on dwm.exe and uses cmd.exe as a shell, you can accomplish something similar but with most of the functionality of a standard installation on regular Windows 10 installations by:
- Installling any drivers you may need - Turning off the UAC - set it to the most insecure setting since the UAC prompt is an Immersive interface. Possibly turn off SmartScreen as well.
- Renaming C:\Windows\System32\dwm.exe and replacing it with a copy of another file with the same name, such as using the rundll32.exe file as a placeholder. You'll get a black screen of nothing if you do not have a file in place of dwm.exe.
- Renaming C:\Windows\System32\Windows.UI.Logon.dll to force the console window. Registry modifications no longer work for this. - In the Registry, change the Shell value at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Winlogon so that it is cmd.exe. This would open the Command Prompt similiar to what Windows Server Core does. You can run the Windows Explorer by typing 'explorer.exe'
But you won't get to configure or access the immersive interfaces such as Windows Defender and Windows Update whereas on Windows Server you can configure Windows Update via the sconfig utility. If you want to be a bit more secure, you can create a separate administrator account and use that for administrative tasks. I haven't tested this thoroughly with other executables yet though.
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Post by anixx on Jun 24, 2018 6:29:13 GMT -8
> - Renaming C:\Windows\System32\dwm.exe and replacing it with a copy of another file with the same name, such as using the rundll32.exe file as a placeholder. You'll get a black screen of nothing if you do not have a file in place of dwm.exe.
You can use the same trick as for task manager to run rundll.exe instead of dwm.exe without replacing it.
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Post by anixx on Jun 24, 2018 8:55:35 GMT -8
This reg file should disable DWM:
Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\dwm.exe]
"Debugger"="C:\\Windows\\System32\\rundll32.exe"
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Post by Aesthetic Classic on Jun 24, 2018 9:35:28 GMT -8
This reg file should disable DWM: Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\dwm.exe] "Debugger"="C:\\Windows\\System32\\rundll32.exe" Nice! Just tested this and it manages to disable the DWM just like replacing the files but it's more tedious to restore if you mess up and can't boot normally. Now if there's only a Registry method around for getting the console window log on prompt without changing files around for newer versions of Windows. |
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Post by R.O.B. on Jun 24, 2018 10:25:49 GMT -8
Nice! Just tested this and it manages to disable the DWM just like replacing the files but it's more tedious to restore if you mess up and can't boot normally. If you can't boot normally after doing this, here's what I would recommend: Step 1: Boot to Recovery Mode. Step 2: Open Command Prompt, and run regedit. Step 3: Click on HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE, then go to File > Load Hive. Navigate to <System Drive>\Windows\System32\config, and open the file called SOFTWARE (with no extension). NOTE: <System Drive> may not be C: in recovery mode, so pay attention to the drive's label and contents to be sure it's the correct drive. Step 4: Name it whatever you want, it doesn't really matter. I'll just use SOFTWARE-TMP as an example. Step 5: You've now loaded what would be HKLM\SOFTWARE in Windows, so just navigate to HKLM\SOFTWARE-TMP\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\DWM.exeStep 6: Delete/change the Debugger value. Step 7: Reboot |
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Post by stek11936 on Aug 2, 2019 15:45:42 GMT -8
This reg file should disable DWM: Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows NT\CurrentVersion\Image File Execution Options\dwm.exe] "Debugger"="C:\\Windows\\System32\\rundll32.exe" Is this working for Windows 10 1803 |
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Post by slackjongi on Aug 11, 2021 6:55:24 GMT -8
I've tried doing the same thing and the start menu doesn't work at all. any guide?
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TK50P
New Member
Posts: 9
OS: Windows 7 Enterprise SP1 x64
Theme: Default
CPU: Intel Core i5 10600KF
RAM: 32GB
GPU: NVIDIA GTX 1660 SUPER
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Post by TK50P on Aug 10, 2023 2:55:27 GMT -8
I've tried doing the same thing and the start menu doesn't work at all. any guide? You need to install Classic shell and StartisBack. |
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