Tiny11 Builder 2025 Round 3: Customization Fails, New Laptop Install ⭐

Over the past several weeks, the Windows 11 version 25H2 install that I customized with Tiny11 Builder has survived two Patch Tuesday updates and one Preview update without regressing to its normal enshittified state. This is a solid indication that this tool is a great way to de-enshittify Windows 11, assuming you don’t mind starting over with a clean install.

So I figured it was time to take the next step, which I assumed would involve customizing the Tiny11 Builder-based installation script so that I could include several apps that it omits by default and then installing Windows 11 using the customized ISO on a different PC.

This did not go well.

Mistakes I have made

My attempts to customize the Tiny11 Builder script were straightforward. I simply opened tiny11maker.ps1 in Notepad and took a look.

You don’t have to be a PowerShell expert to know where to turn here: If you scroll through this script, you’ll come across a not quite alphabetized list of apps. These are the apps that Tiny11 Builder will exclude from the customized ISO it creates.

In my first attempt, I removed the following apps from this script:

• Microsoft.GamingApp

• Microsoft.MSPaint

• Microsoft.Paint

• Microsoft.WindowsCamera

• Microsoft.WindowsTerminal

• Microsoft.Xbox.TCUI

• Microsoft.Xbox.App

• Microsoft.XboxGameOverlay

• Microsoft.XboxGamingOverlay

• Microsoft.XboxIdentityProvider

• Microsoft.XboxSpeechToTextOverlay

• Microsoft.YourPhone

• Microsoft.WindowsTerminal

Then, I saved the script, and proceeded as before, and as described in the first article. The script took about 20 minutes to do its thing, and when it was done, I copied the custom ISO it created to a USB stick and then used that to install Windows 11 on a different laptop. Setup just presented the first few screens of its first-boot experience, in windowed form, including the step to format the disk. And then it rebooted and did the install offline.

Long story short, after I stepped through the Out of Box Experience (OOBE) and signed into Windows 11, I was confronted by a pretty normal configuration, one that included both Microsoft Edge and OneDrive. Oops.

So I started over, a few days later.

For the second pass, I was a little less aggressive with the apps list, figuring that one or more of those entries played some role in forcing Microsoft Edge, especially, back into the install. Basically, I left all the modern apps I had tried to include, leaving just the Paint and Terminal entries.

But no. After about an hour of work and waiting, I once again landed on the Windows 11 desktop. And saw that Edge and OneDrive were installed.

Doy.

While I tried yet another version of this install, this time with just Paint, I finally did the obvious and RTFM, meaning I went to the Tiny11 Builder repository on GitHub to see if NTDEV, the script’s creator, had written anything about customizing it. And while there isn’t much, he does include “more flexibility in what to keep and what to delete” in the to-do list. So … yeah.

Here’s the thing.

De-enshittifying Windows 11 is like a lot of things in life. You can do it proactively or you can react when things go wrong and try to fix it after the fact. What I like about Tiny11 Builder is that it’s proactive: You perform a clean install of Windows 11 without any of the crap and then you add the apps and services you want. On some vague level, it would be nice to customize this script so that it included exactly what I want. But installing a handful of apps, things like Paint, Clipchamp, and Xbox, isn’t hugely problematic or time-consuming. And you only need to do this once.

So back in the maelstrom it is, this time with reduced expectations.

Tiny11 Builder on a second PC

With that multi-day defeat behind me, I started over. I recreated a clean Tiny11Builder-based ISO and used Rufus to create new USB-based installation media. Then, I booted into the Recovery Environment so I could then boot off the new installation media. And I installed Windows 11 normally. Or, mostly normally.

I wiped out all the partitions on the laptop’s 512 GB SSD and then installed Windows 11 offline using a local account with no password (initially). When I got to the correctly minimal Desktop, I had to connect an Ethernet cable because the Wi-Fi card wasn’t detected during the stripped-down Setup process.

From there, I installed all available Windows Updates over a few reboots, and connected to the Wi-Fi. I also updated all the in-box apps and services through the Microsoft Store apps.

When that was finally done, I added a password to the local account, converted it to a Microsoft account (MSA), and added a PIN and Windows Hello facial and fingerprint recognition. Then, I enabled disk encryption in Settings and went to clean up Windows Security, only to be surprised that it was all set.

Then, I proceeded normally, for me: I used my Windows Package Manager (winget) bulk app install script to blast all the apps I use onto the laptop. And went into the Store app to find the few stragglers that Tiny11 Builder had excluded, like Clipchamp, Paint, and Xbox. And wondered, not for the first time, why I had overthought this in the first place.

Finally, I configured Synology Drive to sync with the NAS and began configuring the apps I use regularly. And I will use this laptop as much as possible this week, though we fly back to Pennsylvania on Friday. When we get back, I will start putting Tiny11 Builder-customized Windows 11 installs on multiple PCs there as well. Including, I hope, at least one Windows 11 on Arm laptop.

And who knows? Maybe we’ll be able to customize the install script someday too. But as it is, Tiny11 Builder works well enough for me to use and recommend. And it will be something I add to the new edition of the Windows 11 Field Guide.