My computer has accumulated some cruft that’s making it hard to manage, and resetting the PC seems like the most straightforward way to deal with it. I already have all my important files saved elsewhere. I also wanted to see if I could kill two birds with one stone and rid myself of the dependence on an MS account. I’ve seen there’s some terminal stuff you can do when installing Windows fresh that bypasses the mandatory account creation, but does that still work when resetting? Especially when resetting from the cloud?
And because someone is going to say “Just use Linux”, believe me, I’d love to, but the user experience sucks for literally anyone who isn’t a software developer and the accessibility has actually gotten worse over the 15 years I’ve tried to use it.
Reset, once it’s done downloading (if you go cloud), pull your network cable. When it gets to “let’s get you online” hit shift f-10 which pulls up the terminal window. Type oobe\bypassnro and hit enter. Stay offline, and get back to the same spot in the install process but this time you’ll have a “I don’t have internet” link as an option. It’ll protest, but you can then move forward with a local account. I literally did it yesterday.
Once you have a local account built, Windows will give you “sign in” alerts in settings and in security.
Just for the record, I use Linux. I do however work in a Windows shop and understand that “just use Linux” isn’t at all helpful when someone asks a Windows question.
BypassNRO was removed from system files in 25H2 last year, unless you happened to be served an old ISO this won’t work anymore.
This is what I’ve been using since:
- Complete the initial Windows 11 install and restart your PC.
- When you reach the Secondary Keyboard Layout screen (before the Microsoft Account sign-up stage), press Shift + F10
- In the console, type the command: start ms-cxh:localonly
- Hit Enter, then press Escape to close the console.
You can also use Rufus to make a setup drive which preconfigures the local account. This method and others are described in this article.
PS: It still works if you copy the BypassNRO.cmd file from an old system to a new one when you’re in OOBE mode (Ctrl+Shift+F3) during setup. It’s just a powershell command that sets a registery key and reboots.
Huh, that’s weird that I’ve been able to use the bypass NRO trick pretty consistently at work and at home… I should have mentioned the Rufus thing too, but he was doing this as a reset, not as a new install, so I didn’t.
Yeah check which version of windows it installs, it’ll be 22H2 or 24H2.
I just got top work and asked a senior tech: 24H2 + a 25H2 enablement package to make bypassnro still work for us. Geez.
Honestly I have no idea how they keep getting away with adding more and more hurdles for local account creation. Literally no other OS for mobile or PC has this.
I’ve seen anything from devices with a local account automatically enabling bitlocker with no way of recovering if bitlocker trips to devices with an MS account tripping bitlocker only to find out the recovery keys are not saved to the MS account, absolutely bonkers.
This is odd because just yesterday I used it to reluctantly install Win11 as a quarantined VM for my lovely but stubbornly insistent wife. It was a tiny11 iso, though, so maybe it gets added back during image creation?
And if you still get prompted for an MS account, hit shift+F10 again and run
start ms-cxh:localonlyand they say linux is the complicated one
Hehe… Try installing VMware Player or Genshin Impact in Fedora! (Those are my two most recent headaches.) Any OS can be a pain, it just seems like Linux is getting friendlier every year and Microsoft becomes more overtly the enemy.
to be fair genshin impact is supposed to have an anticheat that blocks it from running at all, no?
at this point most linux issues comes from external factors, where on windows everything is tailor-made for it and windows itself breaks.
dunno about vmware though, i tend to use the native options that work exceptionally well.
Yeah, I would do the same… Loving toolbox! I have to support some clients with VMWare though…
ha. that’s always a drag, but i’m glad you managed to get it to run at least
Thanks, have an upvote :)
I want to reiterate the importance of the “pull the network cable” part. If you fail to unplug the cable before the setup wizard detects that there is the possibility of a network connection, on some systems it will actually prevent you from making a local account altogether, as it will force you to connect to a network which will skip the shift-f10 step.
We had this issue setting up demo models on laptops for awhile, if you didn’t disable the wifi adapter before it saw there was networks available(even if they were password protected) it would require a second factory reset to even get to the point where it would let you setup a local account.
Fyi you can join a network and go up to the point of Microsoft login, then use
start ms-cxh:localonlyto force local account creationIt depends on the system, some of them once connected to a network won’t allow shift-f10 to open a prompt.
I always disable the card in the BIOS before I do anything that requires it to be disconnected. In this case I had both an Ethernet adapter and WiFi radio. Both were disabled and I’m currently typing from my newly decrappified and locally managed system.
Here are my exact steps:
- go to “reset this PC”
- select the cloud install
- select the option to erase everything
- wait for the installer to download. The machine will restart. In my case my Windows bootloader is broken and it tries to boot using GRUB. I haven’t figured out how to fix it including “fix boot” or whatever the recovery option is, but that’s neither here nor there. I rebooted from GRUB, went into the BIOS, and disabled all networking hardware (Ethernet and WiFi).
- Rebooted again (I have to manually go into the one time boot menu every time) and go into Windows. Once it gets to the “Let’s get you connected” screen, I pressed
shift+F10, then enteredoobe\bypassnro. - The computer immediately rebooted and started the install wizard again (asking about keyboard layouts and such).
- On the “Let’s get you connected” screen, there was now a tiny unhighlighted option
I don't have internet. I clicked it and it let me create a local account.
My 80 year old mother switched to Linux this year and she’s managing just fine.
Experiences vary. My 67 year old mother requires my help every few months because Ubuntu managed to fuck up itself again. Or because she managed to do so. I wish I could switch her to something more stable (fuck, even Windows didn’t give here that much trouble back in the days), but due to an accident she can’t handle a change like that anymore. So fuck my life, I’m stuck with supporting that piece of shit excuse of a Linux distro.
It’s not hard to change the underlying distro while preserving look and feel. You could switch her over to Debian stable + gnome and I doubt she would even notice
You have to boot without network access then do the terminal command.
What distro of Linux did you use that was so difficult? Something like Mint is very entry level and intuitive. You don’t have to run any terminal commands if you don’t want to, and the out of box configuration is good enough that you don’t have to modify anything for a stable, up to date system.
What distro of Linux did you use that was so difficult? Something like Mint is very entry level and intuitive. You don’t have to run any terminal commands if you don’t want to, and the out of box configuration is good enough that you don’t have to modify anything for a stable, up to date system.
I started with Ubuntu 8.10 in early 2009. From there I’ve tried mostly Ubuntu but have explored other distros. My usage pattern usually goes like this. I get sick of some Windows BS or just want to convince myself I’m a competent IT industry professional. I install some Linux distro on a separate SSD and only boot into that for as long as I can. The phase usually lasts from a week to about 2 or 3 months. My longest I think was between November 2023 and March of 2024 where I used Mint. I’ve tried all the various *buntus, Pop!_OS, CentOS (RIP). I’ve even used Arch btw, installed it myself and everything. In the end I either run into something that simply doesn’t exist on Linux or get sick of arcane kludges for things that just work on Windows and then come crawling back to Bill feeling defeated. This happens at least once a year but usually more.
Non-existent accessibility is the biggest hurdle, and I have zero faith that it will improve. Accessibility is an afterthought even for huge companies with the resources to devote to it, and you can forget about it for the comparatively smaller loose associations of developers contributing to the software stack that is a typical Linux distro. I was there for the transition from GNOME 2 to Unity and eventually to GNOME 3, as well as from X to Wayland, and it’s just been downhill each time. Orca simply doesn’t work, period. Magnification, if present at all, is glitchy and prone to freezing or crashing. The best I can do is a workaround using espeak and xclip to speak text copied to the clipboard, which, yes, involves the terminal. Is it cool that that’s possible? sure. But I have to put an alias into my .bashrc and constantly tab back and forth between whatever I’m reading and the terminal. Not a big deal if you’re only doing it once or twice, but I have to do it hundreds of times a day. If you encounter a little issue that often it’s no longer little. On windows it’s just ctrl+alt+LMB that’s it.
I find it’s really hard to impress upon sighted users why this is a problem. Imagine someone hands you a laptop, but the monitor either doesn’t work or shuts off at random. Then when you complain, you’re told “It works for me” or “That’s not my problem” or “I don’t know how to help you” or if you’re lucky, a half-dismissive “We’re working on it.” That’s Linux when you’re blind. Can you live with a non working display? Would you call an OS like that ready to ship? Yes this is a problem with commercial software as well, but it’s orders of magnitude worse with Linux.
And because someone is going to say “Just use Linux”, believe me, I’d love to, but the user experience sucks for literally anyone who isn’t a software developer and the accessibility has actually gotten worse over the 15 years I’ve tried to use it.
Don’t listen to people who suggest Ubuntu (or its downstreams) and the clownshow GNOME desktop environment.
If you have a spare USB lying around, try this live (without installing) to see if you like it and please do share your feedback: https://fedoraproject.org/kde/
Or even just your general gripes with Linux. I had the same outlook when I first tried Ubuntu but I didn’t realize it was just Ubuntu and GNOME being really crappy until I tried a different distro and DE.
but does that still work when resetting?
Yeah, once you reach the setup screen and it asks you to connect to the internet, hit Shift + F10 (sometimes CTRL + Shift + F10) and it’ll pop open a CMD window in which you want to type in “oobe\bypassnro” and hit enter. PC should restart and when you reach the internet screen again, there should be an option that says “I don’t have internet”. Click that and make your local account.
If it doesn’t work, sometimes you have to do it twice. Just did it yesterday on a real machine and it worked first try, but every VM I’ve made had me do it twice.
And because someone is going to say “Just use Linux”, believe me, I’d love to, but the user experience sucks for literally anyone who isn’t a software developer a
well that’s bullshit, I went to LMDE 3 years ago and all I did was install a new NVME, booted off a thumb drive and the os installed it, no issues since. Including an entire OS upgrade with a few clicks when Debian went from 12 to 13.
I wanted a few YT videos on how to configure the GUI.
Everything I need can be installed via Flat pack, which is a GUI software installer
I have dicked around with the CLI but only as a curiosity.
Thai said if you want to do exactly as you did in windows then … stick to wibdiws, if you want a GUI and happy to change course on apps eg I went from Lightroom to Darktable, use Inkscpae and I used LibreOffice on windows anyway but Nemo shits all over Explorer
BUT I NEED THE LATEST PHOTOSHOP and MS WORD! ! IT’S NON-NEGIOTABLE /s
I mean, it’s a pretty good argument and writing people’s needs off doesn’t help people go to Linux.
I’m not a software developer and Linux has been fantastically easy for me to understand and use on my personal machine. Especially easier than windows 11 that my employer installed on my work machine.
I would suggest that it would be more accurate if you would focus on your own experiences and difficulties with Linux instead of bringing up “anyone who isn’t a software developer”.
OP is (presumably) vision impaired and accessibility still sucks on Linux.
Make the ISO with Rufus USB. Bonus points also for googling the “windows unattended script”
Ubuntu is super easy
deleted by creator
What has your own research found?
