Creating a custom default user profile in Windows 10

[@Roachness99]

Thank you so much. This is the best video by far I have found on this subject. Clear and to the point.

[@harishsaini85]

Thanks James for this great video, with default profile we can create new users having modified new default profile, but is there any way, if we can make changes to existing profiles, example if my company decide to install one new software or some thing else, whose settings i need to implement on my existing user (L1, L2, L3... L30)

[@AmauriiJimenez]

friend at minute 20:54 I don't know how to find the path of my iso I'm in a VMWare virtual machine mounting an iso in this path: H:VIRTUAL MACHINEWin10_LTSC_x64_es_19044.1288.211006-0501.21h2.iso could you leave me a written path that I should use to replace.

[@vicster9401]

Excellent and useful presentation - many thanks !

[@nissl24]

This video deserves more likes!!

[@PapaVentrex]

Great Video! Helped me alot! Maybe a small advise. Could you add some Timestamps to it?

[@tedshaneyfelt2263]

Maybe you could create a PS script to export and copy all of the start menu items to the Task Bar xml element. (No need to edit and copy the application IDs around manually) or even use a name on a start menu group to identify items that you want put on the start bar. That would simplify some of some of the messy manual editing details.

[@TheVladimusPrime]

This was a life saver. thanks!

[@masihqashqai9374]

Thank you for the video. Is this method still supported in 2024 for Windows 11 for example?

[@victorlicas3183]

Hello James, very interesting, However from where is the step 4. I wanted to skip the taskbar part but where do I move forward from it.?

[@Tikolu]

Your voice sounds a lot like "Jim Browning", great tutorial by the way.

[@cheungandy274]

Hi James, awesome videos👍 Could you please create a video on creating a custom default user profile in Windows 11. Million thanks🙏🙇‍♂

[@TheAdotk]

Hello After imaging some pcs we noticed loads of softwares exe in the dowoads folder located in the default user profile. Is there a way to clear the download folder in the default user folder?

[@theminester7897]

Thank you very much for this tutorial!

[@troygrover3977]

Good Work James!

[@junglejamesie]

Excellent video. Some questions. In the default profile: 1 - if I set up various file associations (eg. all .txt files open with Notepad++; all .jpg files open with IrfanView, etc) will this carry over into the default profile? 2 - I like to use Quick Launch ( %userprofile%\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Quick Launch ) instead of 'pin to taskbar' for my taskbar shortcuts. Will this also carry over? 3 - I also like to have Open Shell installed (formally Classic Shell). Will this also carry over? Thanks for the concise video. 👍

[@JamesRankin1]

1. Yes 2. Yes, as long as the programs they point to are there. 3. Classic Shell should be installed per-device, so the program should be there and the settings should carry over, yes.

[@junglejamesie]

@@JamesRankin1 Hi James. I tried this on a Win10 Pro VM. It **almost** worked but there were some issues. 1 - after sysprep I got a number of oobe warnings, 3 or 4, which I had to skip through. 2 - File associations didn't work for some files, like txt files with Notepad++, jpg & tiff files with IrfanView, even PDF files were not associated AR, despite me setting all these as default prior to sysprep. 3 - The old skool *Quick Launch* taskbar did not appear at all. I suppose I *might* be able to set that on the Active Directory somewhere? I was hoping this would be a default setting. Open Shell and all Desktop shortcuts worked ok, so it's *nearly* there. Also, I set Libre Office files to save in Microsoft format by default, and that also worked. Thanks again.

[@zaldivar69]

useful for me!!. How to rename computer name with unatend.xml file, i.e. "LAPTOP-serialnumber" ? thanks

[@kjellerstua4686]

can I do this locally? not on hyper v \ Rdc. I want my friends not to get my apps on their profile. Wish it was possible to create a separate program files on their home folder, so they do not have to inherit mine. Btw I use windows server as virtual machine and my local i have win 10.

[@JamesRankin1]

Applications are installed globally to the device and any other users will see the shortcuts to those apps as they are normally provisioned into %ALLUSERSPROFILE%\Microsoft\WIndows\Start Menu\Programs. If you wanted users on the same machine not to see apps that were installed, you can either remove the shortcuts from that area and put them into a %USERPROFILE% area, although they will still be able to see the programs through the indexer. Ideally, you could use FSLogix App Masking to hide the apps and their shortcuts from all users except the one you want to see them.

[@KobzarAlex1]

thnx, but what to do with OneDrive? Do I need to reinstall it for correct work?

[@joshyouwa]

great job thanks for the help!

[@rodrigogoncalves3420]

Thanks you so much!

[@justinbrown4033]

When editing your "unattend.xml" file. You mentioned to pay close attention to the "amd64"(processor architecture) and "windows 10 Enterprise". My machine has Intel and I am using windows 10 pro. What do I need to change those to. I tried "intel" and Windows 10 Pro and when rebooting windows failed and said it could not read the unattend.xml file. These two may or may not be connected but I'm curious if I put the correct command in.

[@JamesRankin1]

Amd64 is for 64 bit so you should be fine. You use x86 for 32 bit. Sorry should probably edit that and make it more clear ☺️

[@JamesRankin1]

AMD were first out with x64, hence the notation

[@behnoodmoradi]

Excellent, Thank You.

[@omarhaffarrko]

Thank you very much, it works :D

[@stepanandriyovych]

Hi! What about settings and control panel? Sysprep not working... (

[@JamesRankin1]

Capture those in the profile too, or use policies.

[@NardosKebedeNana]

Hi james, Is there a way for me to put this in a mandatory profile deployment? I am using a production Active Directory 2012 enviroment.

[@JamesRankin1]

Sure, just do all of the above and then rename the ntuser.dat to ntuser.man and put it in the mandatory profile location. You may need to change permissions and whatnot though

[@superXperience]

I admire your patience but I will never walk the same way you describe here. We need to find some app who can do some sort of export-import of profile .. copy or anything to be more useful.

[@TimSENTRY]

Hello James, I was wondering if this will work with Windows 11 Pro? I see that others have asked this question so I apologize if its already been answered.

[@JamesRankin1]

Don't see why it shouldn't, but I haven't tried personally.

[@pa1089]

Hello James. Thank you for the video. How do I capture or use this default profile for SCCM/MDT deployments? Thank you

[@JamesRankin1]

You'd have to have it on your reference image

[@pa1089]

@@JamesRankin1 Thank you I will give it a try. Appreciate the response

[@pa1089]

Hello James just confused on this so if i'm doing this through MDT do i need add a SUSPEND action do all the changes shown in the video and then start the suspend action for the task sequence to complete? How about through SCCM? Thank you

[@DavidSmith-rv1bg]

I followed all the step for Layout Modification, I made sure it looks like your file and I put my customized file in C:\Users\Administrator\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Shell, but when I do the sysprep, the apps I want on the start menu and on the taskbar are not pulling over. Did I copy it to the wrong place? Everything else works great, except for those two items. I am doing this with Windows 10 21H1, does this no longer work for that version?

[@JamesRankin1]

The customized file should go in c:\users\default, not administrator

[@brockbingham2252]

@@JamesRankin1 At some point do you move the file into the default profile? Because most of the video you work from the administrator folder.

[@JamesRankin1]

@@brockbingham2252 the copy profile command copies it

[@brockbingham2252]

That’s what I thought, but I didn’t end up with a layoutmodification.xml file in my default profile shell folder after sysprepping.

[@JamesRankin1]

@@brockbingham2252 yes it only copies AppData. You will need to copy the file from LocalAppData manually in some fashion

[@stephenhowarth7764]

Ripping apart DX with leaving as well all files gor the disassembled standards array to exp perfect log D3d is gone and GLclip has reattached the gl "screamer" to the port

[@NovaAzK]

How to make this config take effect for every users included new user?

[@JamesRankin1]

This is exactly what a custom default profile should do.

[@gwire42]

I am having problems with Windows 10 Ent 20H2. What version are you on? Also, Within the unattend.xml, why do you have to reference Win10 ISO? I would run sysprep from the popup window, then capture the image. Then I would use Autounattend.xml during the installation for copyprofile. That no longer works on 20H2. Its almost impossible to find a straight forward, black and white procedure. All I see are custom variants for unknown versions of Windows 10. Do you know of any Microsoft Custom Default Profile procedure for 20H2 and newer?

[@JamesRankin1]

At time of recording this would have been latest version (whatever was latest August 2020). You reference the ISO so it can find the necessary source files, I would presume

[@gwire42]

@@JamesRankin1 Thank you, I have ran your unattend.xml and I am now capturing the image. I will run the Autounattend.xml without the copyprofile switch. I will let you know if it works.

[@gwire42]

Unfortunately the only thing that still works is the importing default Apps and the Layoutmodification.xml. With 20H2 I lost the desktop background, Desktop Icon settings (This PC, etc..), My Pictures missing desktop backgrounds, control panel view settings, Internet Options settings, some file associations. Can you test on a current version and confirm? It would be a good next video. I know you can Set from group policy but I do not want to chance breaking when joining the domain. seems like copyprofile partially worked. wtf.

[@JamesRankin1]

@@gwire42 let me test next week if possible

[@gwire42]

Wait. It does not like something with my Autounattend.xml answer file. I removed it and it worked. Hmmm. Back to the drawing board. Its a straight forward answer file. It might have to do with adding a admin user.

[@RamonNicotari]

Your unattend file is Windows 10 Enterprise. Is it works for Windows 10 Pro or I need to creat a new unattend file using Windows SDK? Tks

[@JamesRankin1]

I would just try editing my file to say Professional instead, might work

[@chrismckenzie3589]

Does this work with Windows 11?

[@deilsoncso]

How do you keep the taskbar clean, with no icon on it? Like this? because I tried and it didn't work

[@JamesRankin1]

I just remove them in the custom default profile. You can use that XML for enforcing particular pinned items, but I don't think it works for blanking it.

[@deilsoncso]

@@JamesRankin1 in the Microsoft documentation says that to remove the default applications folder leave this way:

[@JamesRankin1]

@@deilsoncso I remember that XML file being pretty fiddly to get to work. But as I said, doing it in the default profile works for me.

[@deilsoncso]

@@JamesRankin1 I have an absurd difficulty to put this Layout in SCCM, do you have any videos teaching you how to do this?

[@JamesRankin1]

@@deilsoncso why not just it in the default profile in your base image? Or are you building from scratch each time?

[@sethzwicker3631]

Great video! Question: Can this be done to a Win10 VM in Azure or is it too far along in the process to be modified at this stage?

[@JamesRankin1]

Good question! Let me find out....

[@JamesRankin1]

I have to say I'm not entirely sure. I know you can upload sysprepped images into Azure so that might be the way forward. However on an Azure image from the gallery I'm not entirely sure (I'm more of an AWS person currently). However, I don't see any reason why you couldn't (assuming a local image and your Azure image had the same applications installed) create a custom default profile on a local image and simply copy the c:\Users\Default folder into your Azure image, replacing the existing c:\Users\Default folder on the Azure image (maybe renaming the old one is better!) Hope that helps until I can get some time in Azure to test more fully.

[@henrymagembe9398]

Good

[@ruslanhairullins2992]

Thank you, but you lose taskbar settings in new profile 😅

[@JamesRankin1]

Not when I did it you didn't

[@ruslanhairullins2992]

@@JamesRankin1 thank you very much . Yes, you are right, you did not change the taskbar! I didn’t see it, but your request .xml can be easily supplemented with this feature and uploaded through the import command., thanks again, there are few places where there is a video on how to simply enter sysrep.

[@Eradifyerao]

I am not with you so far... All I wanted to do was duplicate the account layout settings into a new user account... I guess that just isn't possible without egregious headaches....

[@miicar204]

welcome to the new microSOFT! it used to be a feature, they left the button in, greyed out, for a laugh i gues..

[@WMDracutus]

Hi James, Brilliant video thank you! From my understanding, this method is good for creating a custom default user on 1 machine. Do you have a way to transfer this profile to other machines? Im guessing 1 way would be to create the custom profile in a vm machine and save the image? Or can you just copy and paste the profile to another machine and then create other users? Cheers

[@JamesRankin1]

if you've created it with the right permissions and the machines are in the same AD domain, you should be able to transfer it to other machines. What I normally do is create it within a single "master" image and then create all my machines from that image, but the principle is the same.

[@WMDracutus]

Thanks for your reply. It looks like creating the Single Master image and use that to deploy is the easiest option, thanks as im currently working outside of an AD environment. If you do need to upgrade the windows version for this, im guessing you will have to do the whole process again? Which is why i was wondering if you could just transfer the user profile rather that use the image?

[@JamesRankin1]

@@WMDracutus You don't necessarily have to change with Windows versions - some may work when transferred.

[@WMDracutus]

thank you again. Another q, if that is ok, in Audit Mode, the news and interests bar, along with meet now do not show for me, even in settings, there for i can not disable it and apply that to the default profile. Is there a way you know to force this or need to then rely on Group Policy to remove alone with other changes not applicable to the default profile?

[@JamesRankin1]

@@WMDracutus You can disable News and Interests either by using Group Policy or grabbing the Registry value that the GPO uses and applying that

[@softehardsolutionsinformatitca]

Hi dear James, First of all thanks for sharing your knowledge, this is priceless... My question is how would these changes in the Start menu and taskbar layout look like if the start menu was completely clean and only the file explorer was fixed on the taskbar? Could you share an example, please? Thanks in advanced.

[@MercyDesire]

44 t 6

[@stanmorgan1054]

Hi James. I don't know if you still monitor the comments here but what if you want to create a custom default profile from a profile that's already on the computer?

[@JamesRankin1]

It's very tricky to do. I tried writing a conversion script to work with existing profiles but it was very hit and miss.

[@stanmorgan1054]

@@JamesRankin1 🙄 I was hoping you had a easier solution. I created a powershell script that backed up the default profile and created a new default profile from the profile you wanted to mirror. It worked pretty well for a while until version 1903 (I think). After that the Microsoft store and some apps wouldn't run or even show up in the profile unless you reinstalled them. So I ended up creating another script that installed the Microsoft store, Calendar, Calculator, Stick Notes, etc. Just the apps you will need and not all that extra stuff.

[@stanmorgan1054]

Can you create a tutorial on how to use CopyProfile? Will that work for this scenario?

[@JamesRankin1]

@@stanmorgan1054 CopyProfile only works on the default profile. I can share the script but it may run into issues, I never got around to finishing it as it just seemed way too erratic

[@stanmorgan1054]

@@JamesRankin1 Yeah while reading the documentation on it seems way too erratic as you've said.

[@cranination]

Stickies...Why Microsoft? lol

[@raquelduarte5921]

Excellent, Thank You.