Introducing tiny11 a lightweight and debloated Windows 11 for less powerful PCs

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[satrow]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8YIadhWbho

“After months of requests, tiny11 is finally here!
Based off of Windows 11 Pro 22H2, tiny11 has everything you need for a comfortable computing experience without the bloat and clutter of a standard Windows installation.
It just uses around 8GB of space compared to the 20+GB that a standard installation does.
You can upgrade from Windows 10 and install it on unsupported devices.”

keep in mind is that you still need a valid key to activate Tiny11—no piracy here

Get tiny11 from the link below:
https://archive.org/details/tiny-11_202302 [Mod edit; URL corrected]

https://www.neowin.net/news/tiny11-is-outa-lightweight-and-debloated-windows-11-for-less-powerful-computers/

• This topic was modified 1 month, 3 weeks ago by satrow. Reason: Bad URL (https://archive.org/details/tiny-11_2...) corrected

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Is Tiny a Microsoft product? Who owns and produces this product?

Carpe Diem {with backup and coffee}
offline▸ Win10Pro 2004.19041.572 x64 i3-3220 RAM8GB HDD Firefox83.0b3 WindowsDefender
offline▸ Acer TravelMate P215-52 RAM8GB Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1265 x64 i5-10210U SSD Firefox106.0 MicrosoftDefender
online▸ Win11Pro 22H2.22621.1413 x64 i5-9400 RAM16GB HDD Firefox112.0b3 MicrosoftDefender

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SupremeLaW

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https://twitter.com/NTDEV_/status/1621523335476551680

NTDEV @ntdev@mastodon.social
@NTDEV_

1. Tiny11 is not serviceable, but .NET, drivers and security definiton updates can still be installed from Windows Update.

2. While I can understand that installing modified versions of Windows can pose a security risk, I can assure you (and you can obviously check for yourself) that the image doesn’t have anything from external sources added to it.

3. The main way that tiny11 gets its small size is by the removal of Windows Component Store (WinSxS). As such, the installation of new features or languages is unfortunately not possible

4. At it’s core, tiny11 is designed to bring new life to old computers, so I don’t encourage installing it on PCs that support Windows 11 by default. This doesn’t mean that I don’t trust my product, but at one point the disadvantages outweigh the benefits.

5. This shouldn’t be considered a “Windows without telemetry/spyware” image, but one that was designed to run on PCs that don’t support the standard versions of Windows 11, in the same line that tiny10 did with Windows 10…

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geekdom wrote:

Is Tiny a Microsoft product? Who owns and produces this product?

No, it is not.
It is a tweaked Microsoft Windows 11.
Require a Windows license, gets Windows updates…

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SupremeLaW

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Alex,

Tiny11 intrigued me so I loaded it up on my Test Rig (DellXPS 8700) and I’m impressed!

So far:

Even though I did a clean install it recognized my digital license and loaded 11 Pro!

I loaded my PowerShell library and all my programs work just fine xmal forms and all.

Loaded RoboForm Everywhere and I now have all my passwords.

Loaded Macrium Reflect Free V6-1865 and it works perfectly. I took an image so I can switch back and forth between W10 & Tiny11.

Load Chrome with my extensions (RoboForm, NoScript, uBlock Origin, and Privacy Badger.

Setup a wallpaper with one of my pictures of Victoria Falls and gee you can now display it across both monitors in my dual monitor setup.

Didn’t think I’d like 11 based on my earlier force load but this version is growing on me. It’s very snappy and the display scaling seems to work much better than it did in 10. I have my 2 27″ displays set at 125% and the Text adjusted to 120% and I haven’t seen any problems.

What I still don’t like is the need for extra clicks necessary in most right-click menus, the fact that I can’t add my own toolbars (I have quite an elaborate setup that I can’t use in 11).

Other that the toolbar problem I haven’t found anything I can’t do with Tiny11.

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Vincenzo, SupremeLaW, Alex5723, satrow, Cybertooth, cyberSAR

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RetiredGeek wrote:

I haven’t found anything I can’t do with Tiny11.

You must know that the big cut in OS storage space was due to the removal of winsxs (mine is 9.8GB in size) which will disable Windows from restoring drivers, dll files…But is part of the “price” to pay 🙂

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SupremeLaW

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Here’s a very interesting article on WinSxS.

It will be interested going forward how this plays out as Win 11 gets updates. I’ll keep y’all informed on my journey.

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Well, today I went on a tear to install software all successful:

• Foxit Reader
• NotePad++
• Open Shell
• Office/Microsoft 365

The only issue was with Open Shell which I had to go into the program directory and run the Settings program then it came up properly. Although, it doesn’t replace the Windows default start button on the task bar only overlays it. This is with the task bar positioned on the left of the screen.

I finally hit the first failure when I tried to run Windows Update. After 5 tries & reboots KB 5022360 (Build 22621.1194) will not install!

I’ve also run into a problem with the Memory Protection feature but that is due to the old Radeon 7500 card in the PC (latest driver is dated 2016!). Searched Dell and AMD and there is no newer driver! So I just clicked the Dismiss button.

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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RetiredGeek wrote:

The only issue was with Open Shell which I had to go into the program directory and run the Settings program then it came up properly. Although, it doesn’t replace the Windows default start button on the task bar only overlays it. This is with the task bar positioned on the left of the screen.

Have you tried using the most recent Open-Shell v4.4.189 pre-release?
So much has been fixed or changed that pertains to Win11 since 4.4.170 final
https://github.com/Open-Shell/Open-Shell-Menu/releases

Keep IT Lean, Clean and Mean!

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SupremeLaW, Cybertooth

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RetiredGeek wrote:

KB 5022360 (Build 22621.1194) will not install!

Its a preview. Check settings.

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SupremeLaW

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I see no indication that it is a Preview?

I set Group Policy to not show Previews.

Tried installing manually after clearing SoftwareDistribution folder. Same result.

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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SupremeLaW

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Normally anything issued outside of Patch Tuesday is a Preview or OOB.

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geekdom, SupremeLaW, Alex5723

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But we don’t live in ‘normal’ times, lol 👍🏻

Cheers

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RetiredGeek wrote:

I see no indication that it is a Preview?

I set Group Policy to not show Previews.

Tried installing manually after clearing SoftwareDistribution folder. Same result.

January 26, 2023—KB5022360 (OS Build 22621.1194) Preview

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https://www.tomshardware.com/news/tiny11-lean-windows-11

De-Bloated Windows 11 Build Runs on 2GB of RAM

By Mark Tyson

Tiny11 uses 8GB of disk space, compared to 20GB+ for the standard install.

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geekdom

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This is a very interesting development, imho.

It just so happens that yesterday I wrote a long THANK YOU letter to Spectrum’s field service Supervisor, after he did a great job tuning up my new 1G Internet connection and cable modem.

In that letter I explored some of the problems I’ve encountered re-purposing older PCs as backup storage servers, and upgrading their NICs to 2.5GbE and faster e.g. with Sabrent’s excellent NT-SS5G USB 3.0 “dongle”.

Would this tiny11 be a promising OS to host such a backup storage server?

Most of the time, I run custom .bat BATCH files that make heavy use of XCOPY to and from Windows Network Drives.

Are Command Prompt and the entire BATCH command set also supported?

In particular, I’d be very interested to read anyone’s experience installing a 2.5GbE adapter and its device driver with this tiny11 OS.

I will LUV to read your reply(s) here.

MANY THANKS!!

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https://www.tomshardware.com/news/stripped-down-windows-11-os-runs-on-200-mb-of-ram

Stripped Down Windows 11 OS Runs on 200 MB of RAM

By Mark Tyson

published about 24 hours ago

Enthusiasts battle to boot tiny11 with the least memory.

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Alex5723

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Hi

I installed  Tiny11 on a virtual machine, to test it out, when I click activate it tells me it can’t reach the licence server.

I’m a home user just wanting to give it a try

Any help would be great

Thanks
Richard

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You need a Windows license for Tiny 11 like any other Windows installation.

keep in mind is that you still need a valid key to activate Tiny11—no piracy here

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Alex5723 wrote:

You need a Windows license for Tiny 11 like any other Windows installation.

keep in mind is that you still need a valid key to activate Tiny11—no piracy here

Hi

I understand that, but it doesn’t give me the option to enter a key, just says it cant find the licence server

I thought maybe I’d installed it as an administrator or something.

Thanks
Rich

 

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You need a network connection from the VM to the internet. Do you have one?

cheers, Paul

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The internet is working fine

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Hi, I’ve registered….Yay

I thought a Screen shot might help. As you can see it’s asking to connect to my ‘Organizations Activation Server’

Should I reinstall with different options or something?

Thanks AGain
Richard

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Looks like you are using a volume license and that requires a licensing server.

cheers, Paul

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You need a Retail license (not OEM, not volume).

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Well, it seems that this is somewhat of a bust. It works well enough and it will do most updates, however, it will NOT update the latest Cumulative Update!

I’ve been through 3 iterations of this:

SC config trustedinstaller start=auto
net stop bits
net stop wuauserv
net stop msiserver
net stop cryptsvc
cd %windir%
Ren SoftwareDistribution SoftwareDistribution.old
cd %windir%\System32
Ren Catroot2 Catroot2.old
dism /Online /Cleanup-image /ScanHealth
dism /Online /Cleanup-image /CheckHealth
dism /Online /Cleanup-image /RestoreHealth
dism /Online /Cleanup-image /StartComponentCleanup
Sfc /ScanNow

W/O any success keep getting both Install and Download Errors.
Time to restore the Win 10 image…

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Alex5723

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tiny11 for Arm64

“By popular request, tiny11 for Arm64 devices is finally here!
This version of tiny11 is great for mobile devices, including Raspberry Pi 4, other WoA devices or Apple M1/M2 VMs!

Based off of Windows 11 Pro 22H2, tiny11 has everything you need for a comfortable computing experience without the bloat and clutter of a standard Windows installation.”

https://twitter.com/NTDEV_/status/1625949087282434081?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

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How to build your own tiny11 (create lightweight Windows image)

“The long-requested video on how to make your own tiny11 is finally here! These are basically the exact steps that were done to create tiny11 beta 2. Fully transparent, no strings attached.

To download MSMG toolkit, visit https://msmgtoolkit.in/
To download NTLite, visit https://www.ntlite.com/download/
“

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Hi All

I have installed tiny11 on a dell which had Widows 10 on it, the activation code is for windows home, but tiny 11 installs the Enterprise version.

Is there a way to install as home, or downgrade the install I have?

Thanks
Richard

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Installed T11B2 on my 8 year old Dell Inspiron laptop and it runs just fine!
I had no problems creating the bootable USB using RUFUS. Only problem encountered was the 2+ hours it took to download the ISO from the Internet Archive.

I’m currently testing the WinGet command on PowerShell to install all my favorite software. This thing is great no browser needed!

I’ll report back when the testing is done.

[Update] See the test results here.

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Cybertooth

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now at YouTube:

Tiny 11 Is A Super Fast Stripped Down Version Of Windows 11, Needs On Only 2GB Ram!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_l0plCryFg

Tiny11 by NTDEV Is a super lite weight and optimized custom build of Windows 11 That runs on systems with as little as 2GB of RAM, It takes up just 8GB of disk space and no TPM 2.0 Is required so running Tiny 11 on older systems not supported officially by windows 11 is easy. In this video show you how to download and Install Tiny 11 on your PC or laptop.

[end quote]

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Cybertooth

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That one YouTube video has 1,611 Comments since February 15, 2023 .

I’ve been perusing those Comments:  very educational!

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Ok, here’s my experience with Tiny11B2 when it comes to updating. Remember that in my trials with Tiny11B1 it would NOT do a Cumulative update.

So when I went into Windows Update there were several updates available so I told it to install.

Results:

Next it popped up with this, the dreaded Cumulative Update 2023-02.

So I clicked Install and by gosh it worked!

I’ll report back when the March updates become available.
However, for now it looks like Tiny11B2 will do updates!

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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SupremeLaW

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Think back to the dawn of PCI-Express, successor to PCI.

PCI-Express has been a fabulous concept, from DAY ONE, for enabling customization with addition and removal of discrete hardware components.

Windows Device Manager made it relatively easy to add, update and remove device drivers.  Not purr-fect, but it does the job almost all of the time.  There are still problems with signed and unsigned drivers, but there are also known workarounds which do the job almost all of the time e.g.:

bcdedit /set nointegritychecks ON

bcdedit /set nointegritychecks OFF

 

Case in point:  our older PCs have been re-purposed as backup storage servers;  and, we finally upgraded almost all of our LAN to 2.5GbE speed.  The XP PCs could not upgraded due to the lack of supported device drivers, so they’ll stay at 1 Gigabit.

Imho, it makes perfect sense to “modularize” Windows so as to guarantee that unwanted and unneeded software components can be discarded, at the same time Windows Updates shall remain available for the modules that ARE wanted and needed.

Why MS does not recognize this as a valuable, and useful market niche is beyond me.

 

Bottom Line:  this option is a natural response to excess complexity.

 

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Cybertooth

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Chris Titus Tech — 11 Microsoft Professional Certifications!

Microsoft is DESTROYING Windows

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7JmN8_URGY

2,762 Comments

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Cybertooth

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SupremeLaW wrote:

Microsoft is DESTROYING Windows

So, why are my installations working so well?  And that’s not even close to the way I deal with printer problems.

I’ve seen a number of YouTube videos along these same lines, and every one that I’ve watched are by folks who seem to want to stay handcuffed to the Windows Start Menu and a mod-free Windows installation.  They either imply or call themselves power users, but demonstrate no use of power, other than using the Run box like it’s a magic tool.

Create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates, in case you need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do. We don't all have to do the same things.

Computer Specs

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SupremeLaW

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SupremeLaW wrote:

Chris Titus Tech — 11 Microsoft Professional Certifications!

Microsoft is DESTROYING Windows

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7JmN8_URGY

“Right-click commands are not even working for me here — could be something I did …”

In half the time he spent recording that video he could have learnt how to access all that he needs from settings instead of control panel. It’s significant that he doesn’t mention anything he was unable to do just because it looks different.

SupremeLaW wrote:

2,762 Comments

One of those YouTube comments:

Josh Hardin 2 weeks ago
The control panel is the old way of doing things and microsoft has been attempting to deprecate it slowly since windows 8. it isn’t necessary anymore. I am an IT consultant and troubleshoot machines every day and haven’t really had any reason to go into the control panel for a really long time. with regards to printers you click on the start menu (or hit the windows key) type printers, and you open “printers and scanners” if you want the properties box for the printer, you click the printer, and then click “printer properties”, if you want the hardware properties you click “hardware properties” it’s really not that hard. to add a printer you click “add device” and then it does a preliminary network search, and you can add it from there or if it doesn’t pop up or you need more advanced configuration, connect to a printer server or whatever, you click on the “add manually” button and up pops the same “add printer” dialog box that they’ve been using since windows 7 (I really hope they deprecate this in favor of an approach that ties in with the settings application a little better). The settings application is the DIRECT replacement for the control panel. the control panel and it’s applets are really only there for legacy users and I suspect that it will be going away completely in windows 12. it’s had it’s day, they’ve just moved to a friendlier interface that’s usually easier to use.

Windows 11 Pro version 22H2 build 22621.1485 + Microsoft 365 + Edge

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SupremeLaW

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Reminder : there is a Tiny10 OS version

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SupremeLaW

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Tiny10 Version 2303 Is Updatable, Occupies Just 5.2GB
By Mark Tyson
published 1 day ago

Final Tiny10 release is aimed at those with “a truly old computer.”

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/tiny10-version-2303-is-updatableoccupies-just-52gb

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Alex5723

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So, maybe MS has made an OS that is better for average non tech users.  But that will not do much good until they fix their Updating System!

Stepping down off my soapbox now.

Experience is that marvelous thing that enables you recognize a mistake as soon as you make it again.

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SupremeLaW

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see “Win Update Stop”

https://www.novirusthanks.org/

https://www.winupdatestop.com/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4kHdvqo3y8

 

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$9 per year?

Windows 11 Pro version 22H2 build 22621.1485 + Microsoft 365 + Edge

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SupremeLaW wrote:

see “Win Update Stop”

I have no intention of stopping automatic updates, since I’m not in a business environment, and I keep multiple copies (including offline) of weekly drive images going back 3 months.  If an update pooches something (which has yet to happen), I can return to my prior state in a matter of minutes.

In my view this is much simpler than trying to block updates which, in my experience, improve my Windows platform.  I do have to re-uninstall Edge and WebView2 from time to time, but that’s trivial with Revo Uninstaller.

Create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates, in case you need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do. We don't all have to do the same things.

Computer Specs

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SupremeLaW, joep517

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This is our first-order approximation for:

OS Complexity “C” ~= ((n^2) – n) / 2

where “n” = number of executing OS processes (cf. Windows Task Manager)

“C” can be illustrated graphically on a flat sheet of paper:

each “process” is a single point

each line segment connects a pair of points

a line segment represents a single contingency

if n = 3, C = 3

if n = 4, C = 6

if n = 5, C = 10

if n = 6, C = 15

etc.

Our Windows 10 Pro x64 Task Manager reports:  212 processes

C = (  (212^2) – 212 ) / 2  =  22,366

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SupremeLaW wrote:

Our Windows 10 Pro x64 Task Manager reports: 212 processes

My Windows 10 Pro x64 Task Manager reports 176 processes.

SupremeLaW wrote:

C = ( (212^2) – 212 ) / 2 = 22,366

C=((176²)-176)/2=15400

My Windows 11 Pro x64 Task Manager reports 174 processes.

C=((174²)-174)/2=15051

I’ve trimmed 36 processes from Windows 10 Pro, 38 processes from Windows 11 Pro, meaning OS complexity can be reduced.  In my experience, a reduction in complexity yields an increase in efficiency and reliability.  I have a number of unnecessary Services disabled, as they are not in any way needed in my Windows platform.

Create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates, in case you need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do. We don't all have to do the same things.

Computer Specs

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SupremeLaW

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15,051 / 22,366  =  67.3%

in other words, using a crude measure of Complexity “C”,

you reduced aggregate Complexity by almost one-third.

If we were to use the same formula, but we input the number of “threads” instead of the number of “processes”, the reduction in C is even more dramatic.

FYI:  on our Windows 10 Pro x64 HP workstation, Task Manager reports a constantly varying number of “threads” averaging 2,000 at any one moment.

C  =  ((2,000^2) – 2000) / 2  =  1,999,000

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Hey Y’all,

Just successfully installed the March cumulative update in Tiny11B2!

I’m lovin’ this on my 8 year old laptop. Currently in the process of setting it up to mimic my daily Win10-Pro driver. So far so good!

Just upgraded my 2 StartIsBack licenses to StartAllBack (3.99! what a deal). I really love this program on W11 looks great and feels like what I’m used to including giving me back my custom toolbars on the taskbar, I was really missing this!

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Proving once again that WE BOOMERS RULE THE GALAXY

(secretly, not openly).

 

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bbearren wrote:

I’ve trimmed 36 processes from Windows 10 Pro, 38 processes from Windows 11 Pro, meaning OS complexity can be reduced.  In my experience, a reduction in complexity yields an increase in efficiency and reliability.

(Still) The holy grail of disabling Windows services.

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SupremeLaW

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Alex5723 wrote:

(Still) The holy grail of disabling Windows services.

I’m running Windows 11.  My NAS runs Windows 10 and it’s purring along just fine with my services configuration.

From the archived Windows 10 service configurations:

“Make sure that your system is up to date.

This information assumes the latest version of Windows 10 with all major updates installed.
Hit Start -> Settings -> Update & Security -> Check now/Install now.”

Seems contrary to the common advice here at AskWoody.  At any rate, I’m quite comfortable with my own methods.

Create a fresh drive image before making system changes/Windows updates, in case you need to start over!

We all have our own reasons for doing the things that we do. We don't all have to do the same things.

Computer Specs

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SupremeLaW

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Re: “Entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity.”

a time-honored engineering principle is this:

the simplest solution is the best solution

compare “Occam’s Razor”:

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Occams-razor

The principle gives precedence to simplicity:

of two competing theories,

the simpler explanation of an entity is to be preferred.

The principle is also expressed as

“Entities are not to be multiplied beyond necessity.”

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Cybertooth

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p.s.  Ockham was not without his faults, however.

For example:

“Motion is merely the reappearance of a thing in a different place.”

Thusly, if I hold a pencil “motionless” at arm’s length,

AND I happen to live on the Earth’s Equator, THEN

it still travels 1,466 feet every second.

1,000 mph at Equator x 5,280 feet per mile / 3,600 seconds per hour  =  1,466 ft/sec.

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LAFTR BRK:

When I was still in high school, our English teacher directed this question to one of our less intelligent classmates:

“What were the Knights of the Round Table searching for?”

Roland’s answer:  “The Holy Quail!”

(Roland’s claim to fame was his uncanny ability to pull down my Quarterback bullet passes, but he still returned to the huddle complaining about his bruised sternum.)

The laughter uproar was so loud, we couldn’t hear another word from the Teacher!

The Holy Quail finally materialized in the Person of the Vice President of the United States!

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Charlie

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I’m having problems installing Tiny 11 on an old PC which does run W10, but is running in MBR. I used Rufus to prepare a USB stick in MBR and tried to boot up from it but it just sits there showing a blue window and makes no progress. I tried to run the prog from inside W10 and get an error message
Any help would be appreciated

A1ex

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Alex,

You need to convert the OS drive to GPT:

Support UEFI and Secure Boot Modes in BIOS: As stated earlier, Microsoft has required UEFI support and secure boot modes in BIOS for Windows 11 installation. Therefore, make sure you meet this requirement before proceeding with the installation.
GPT Disk Type for OS Drive: Your OS drive should be the GPT type to install Windows 11. But, nothing to worry about here because this article is all about installing Windows 11 on the MBR partition.

Most third party Patition Management software supports this feature, although some only in the upgraded paid versions.

Source for above quote.

Update: Nuibi Partition Editor does this in the free version. Note: The current Portable edition does not work, you’ll have to use the installed version or at least try it as I use the portable version.

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Just out of my own curiosity (because I don’t plan to try Tiny11),

during a fresh installation, does it not require the User to format the C: drive?

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Being an OLD guy I can’t remember if it was required, but since the whole Idea is to have a small footprint OS I thought it best to start out fresh and deleted all existing partitions from the drive before booting from the install media.

That said, Formatting a drive will NOT change it from MBR to GPT. You need to use a tool like DiskPart, MBR2GPT.exe or a third party Partition Manager. Of course when selecting the partition to install windows to you use the buttons to delete all the existing partitions that should accomplish the task also. In any case you better have backups!

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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We have had great success with Partition Wizard, BUT

as you point out, the freeware versions of these partition utilities may not support the feature that performs changes from MBR to GPT e.g.:

https://www.partitionwizard.com/free-partition-manager.html

cf. “Convert OS Disk from MBR to GPT” is ONLY available with the “Pro” version.

 

FYI:  a little history here:  MBR partitions are limited to 2TB (if my memory is correct), and that was one of the major motivations to create a new format for monster HDDs with much larger partitions e.g. larger than 2TB.

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