In the realm of operating systems, it’s understood that Windows is the whipping boy. A well-deserved designation too. While MacOS gets out of your way and Linux relishes in standing in it (to the delight of its hardcore users), Windows is just there. Even iOS and Android prove less annoying, despite being as restrictive as your average safe (I see you writing Android enthusiast…that you can root a phone doesn’t mean that anyone can do it).
Far be it from me to say that this is without reason. Why, the entire impetus behind this particular blog entry is the fact that my particular install decided that it really hated itself and wouldn’t be satisfied until it stopped existing. First the store stopped working, which was annoying but not really a dealbreaker. A quick search around support forums (or as Microsoft calls them, the QA department) revealed that this is something that’s been an issue on some installs since Windows 10. A couple of powershell commands did the trick. It’s not that I was in any kind of hurry to get anything from the store, but it’s the principle of the thing.
That fix lasted about two patch Tuesdays more until it did it again. Except this time I didn’t notice it again until Defender decided it wanted to join the fallen arms protest against my install. Considerably and understandably more concerned about this, I attempted the QA department fixes to no avail. A safe-mode virus scan revealed nothing external that could be causing the issues. A small issue with change revealed that the calculator had also decided to call it quits.
This is when I decided to go with the nuclear option. A system refresh. Something that I hadn’t used in a while but distinctly remembered being time consuming, annoying, and ending up with a lot of my data disappearing even when I explicitly told it to do so. But here’s where I got surprised. After popping in my install media and telling it that yes, I basically want a fixed new install…it just did it. No fuss, no complaints. Fifteen minutes and I was happily back to windows 11 23H2 with all of its components present and accounted for. The remaining of my expected install time was spent checking for anything that may have disappeared from the install. Nothing did. In a oasis of Microsoft products barely functioning to the point where they’re merely annoying, something working properly is great. Something that works properly and could save you in a pinch is greater.
Then again, after the install I noticed my C drive was more loaded than expected. Sure enough, windows.old seemed to be roughly the size of a full install. It’s good, not perfect.
