Window Cleaning: Creating a clean Windows 11 install (part 1) - AppX Deprovisioning

A "clean" installation of Windows used to be pretty easy--just erase whatever junked-up install you had, then install a fresh copy straight from Microsoft. Nothing to it. But these days, Microsoft has joined in with the crapware dealers to load your copy of Windows up with an absolute pile of software that is both unneeded and undesirable. Fortunately, Microsoft also provides ways to customize the Windows installation image (and has for years). This is how big businesses (including the big PC builders who deliver Windows with their hardware) can customize Windows and add everything they want to push on you. Now, we're going to use those same tools to reverse the process and remove everything you don't want pushed on you! This is the first in a series. I don't know how long it will go for, but my goal here is to walk you through the entire process, step-by-step, of how we can cut down the Windows 11 installation image until we're left with something that actually looks clean and usable. EXTRA CREDIT: - AppX is a packaging format originally used for Windows Store apps. They've since been replaced by the MSIX format (which aims to replace both the traditional Microsoft Installer [MSI] format and the AppX format in a single standard), but the commands used to work with the packages will probably stay much the same for compatibility! - Removing a provisioned AppX package doesn't uninstall it for anybody who's already had it installed; it just prevents future users from having it install automatically. Conversely, uninstalling it doesn't prevent it from installing for everybody else. - I'm pretty confident in stating that you can't permanently damage anything by experimenting with this process, but that's not entirely correct--if you forget the Path parameter in your PowerShell commands, you could very well start stripping items out of your live Windows installation! And as I mentioned, removing some of these packages could end up permanently crippling Windows in unexpected ways. If you break an installer, that's one thing--start over if you have to. If you break your running system, having to start over could be very painful indeed. So use caution and make sure you're always specifying the Path to your offline mounted image!