How to tell if your Win10 Anniversary Update clobbered Cortana

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That last-minute “fix” may be the worst botched Win10 forced update yet. InfoWorld Woody on Windows Thanks, everybody – especially PKCano and rpodric
[See the full post at: How to tell if your Win10 Anniversary Update clobbered Cortana]

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I noticed my printer had been deleted after update. Also some things returned to a default setting. Like live tiles I turned off were on again and Edge and Store icons returned to taskbar. Also Chrome browser seems really slow and scrolling issues have returned like laggy scrolling. I don’t use Cortana much it appears to be working Ok. I noticed Edge on 1511 release can’t reach the Media Creation Tool web site. I get blank page. Had to use Chrome to access it. For me the annoyance of losing my printer and having to set it up again was my biggest issue. I also noticed Chrome had signed me out after update too. Found this out when I noticed I was being prompted for all my sign in information on sites again.

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To quote Woody’s article on InfoWorld:

“If you type in the search box, Cortana only looks for local files and programs — there’s no intelligent repartee, no search outside the PC. Cortana works, in effect, just like the Search box in Windows 7 or 8.1.”

So Woody…you’re saying Microsoft finally did something the way *I* wanted it rather than the way they did? Par-taaaay!!!

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Windows 10 Anniversary Update is also blowing away ENTIRE PARTITIONS. Some people thought it was attributed to the FossHub hack, but no, it’s straight up Microsoft stupidity.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Windows10/comments/4vyifo/bug_windows_10_anniversary_update_tanked/

https://www.reddit.com/r/sysadmin/comments/4vycur/windows_10_anniversary_update_deleted_a_whole/

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Only the AllowCortana key governs whether Cortana is on (1) or off (0). Well, switching the setting back and forth does not cause any problems with 14393.10 here. After restarting explorer, changes come into affect and Cortana gets turned on/off as expected.

However, the Win 10 AU release rendered the group policy setting Configure Automatic Updates useless in the Win 10 Pro edition. Now, the only workaround to prevent Windows 10 AU from automatically installing updates and rebooting, causing a lot havoc on Hyper-V systems running several VMs, is disabling the Windows Update service at all. Good job, Microsoft! What a bunch of kindergardeners..

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Printers losoing their drivers is a problem in most OS upgrades. Ubuntu Linux and MacOS clobber printers all the time in their upgrades.

That Widnows has done this does not surprise me at all. I have had to reinstall printer drivers in all my OSes whenever they undergo major updates like this one.

The other issues you have noticed look like Windows has been reverted to current defaults for many settings. Check all settings and reset to your preferences.

While you’re at it, look into the many Cortana settings and see if you want to limit any of her features.

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I have only a test laptop with Windows 10 until yesterday on the Insider Track and not using it regularly, so I may not be the best to comment about this issue. However I used Windows 10 on my main 2 laptops until not long ago when I decided to wipe everything out and reinstall Windows 7 for stability and mostly for annoying issues related to the Universal Apps. I had problems with Cortana before following patches, which were generally resolved after running the PowerShell commands to reinstall/repair the Universal Apps. This may or may not be a quick fix to what some of the users reported following the most recent update bringing Windows 10 to version 1607.10.
It is still a mystery though why not everyone experience this problem and what would be the differences in configuration, version, Insider or not etc.

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If this update disabled Cortana, count me in the That’s-A-Feature, Not-A-Bug Camp.

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Clobbered Cortana?

You mean FIXED Cortana?

Quick Woody… Give everybody the KB# so they can Clobber Cortana too before M$ breaks it again… AND IT STARTS WORKING…

Hell I’d install Windows 10… Just to Clobber Cortana! Then I’d revert of course, ‘cauz mama didn’t raise a fool…

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See the earlier note from NetDef. Wonder if that’s the magic key for disabling Cortana?

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🙂

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One thing I hate about the Anniversary Update is that it did not respect more than about 30 percent of my settings. I had to go back through EVERYTHING to reset settingss back like I had them. The average User may set them the first time they upgrade to Win10, probably helped by someone who is computer savvy. But they are going to be reset to MS defaults with the updates, and probably stay that way forever.The average User HAS NO CLUE. And it’s going to drive the techies CRAZY (crazier?).

BTW If you do the AU, Google error code 0x80070057 in relation to the update. 2 of mine hung a 2%. The “disable ethernet/wifi trick worked for me.

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Might be worth looking into the Education Edition which claims that Cortana is disabled by default.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/edu/windows/windows-editions-for-education-customers
Windows 10 Pro Education is effectively a variant of Windows 10 Pro that provides education-specific default settings, including the removal of Cortana.
Windows 10 Education is effectively a variant of Windows 10 Enterprise that provides education-specific default settings, including the removal of Cortana.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/itpro/windows/manage/manage-tips-and-suggestions

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NetDef’s post may contain the key to disabling Cortana, someone interested in Windows 10 might have to go through the documentation and do the testing in various configurations to see what works and what does not.
There is also a tool from VMWare which contains recommended optimisations for virtual desktops, those recommendations may be useful to some power end-users, like many of the readers here, too.
https://labs.vmware.com/flings/vmware-os-optimization-tool

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