You are right. My bad. The latest ISO will still work, you just have to choose the correct version, and enter your install key (at some point).
And after installing Windows 10 you could run the program below to remove Windows 10’s spyware^^
(I haven’t tested it yet though^^)
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I could just be thinking of the old way W7 / W8 had specific OEM versions, and the keys wouldn’t work on retail ISO’s. Haven’t tried so Just asking.
It wouldn’t surprise me if there was now only one version…
I have used that. Its a set of powershell scripts that do a fantastic job of trimming the fat. Some of the scripts are arguably not “effective”…like the one that blocks telemetry IPs in the firewall, but as a whole it does some great things for reducing the number of running processes/services and removing junk that should have never been there in the first place.
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I think I had a problem with this in the past. From what I recall, the OEM key would not activate until you put in another key first, then the OEM key. Really goofy but I do believe that retail copies can be made work with OEM keys. I would suggest finding an OEM copy. I have one on my system that I think I got from the five finger discount section of the internet but its an untouched iso.
I could be wrong. Its been a minute since I went through the motions.
I do it all the time. It works.
Troll comment:
Windows 10 is bloat
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If you don’t feel like going in to the registry too much for removing bloatware you could install a 3rd party firewall (I use Eset) and spend a couple of hours pressing “block permanently”. Just remember to unblock and check for windows updates once in a while because you won’t get notifications anymore (and no forced restarts)
It worked everyone! I made a clean iso and it got rid of all the Dell stuff
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It does, and ironically only the Chinese governement has it. 
I got sick of Windows 10 bloat so I bought a Window 10 LTSB license and upgraded to that. Then I made a system image, and in the future if I ever have to reformat I can just use that.
What slack space are you talking about?
If you format an SSD on an OS with UNMAP/TRIM support that should trigger the total clearing of the physical blocks.
The slack space of a file doesn’t exist once the file is gone.
Are you referring to something about how a SSD maps virtual blocks to physical hardware blocks? Otherwise, on an SSD, I can’t see how overwriting would make any sort of performance difference.
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Warning: not casual in anyway. This and a stroll through system services shutting off unwanted and unneeded services. Stacked with a decent firewall that blocks all traffic incoming and out going. There are several little helpers for various things but for the love of god backup your product keys and download an updated iso. You are more than likely gonna bork something. Backup everything. You can have a reasonible performing windows but it will take some effort. Still whack a mole everytime windows updates and un does some of your work. Once a month, every month. All settings will have to be gone through and set back to your way. Annoying as hell.
Maybe ? We are not talking about actually stripping windows down to the bones. Just a stock reinstall.
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Yes. See, in a dd command, data is written, it’s not an erase function which would invoke trim (we’re overwriting at the block level, not erasing at the filesystem level). So overwriting all the accessible data area, and then doing it again, will get to that ‘slack space’ that exists on SSDs. That slack space is what the SSD uses for wear leveling of the drive. By writing out random data, you are overwriting that slack space on the 2nd pass. It might not be exact, but it’s going to lay down a lot of data on that slack space. I trust my method more than the purported wipe feature that the SSD utility program supposedly does. But I don’t think there is anything wrong with doing that too after my method.
your method overwrites the whole disk.
my method overwrites the :
boot sector
the MFT (master file table)
partition table.
which is all you need to do a fresh install of windows.
if you have sensitive data then by all means your method is the way to go. if you are simply wiping out a bloat/malware ridden OEM install (aka dell ,hp, lenovo,etc) then my way works well.
Yeah, but the title of the topic is “Best method for wiping Windows 10 down to the bones” which I think means a sensitive data wipe. If there isn’t any sensitive data, you can just delete the old partitions during Windows install.
i had to suggest the dd method to someone else, as apparently they could not delete a partition. they (said) they tried linux cfdisk , fdisk , and linux parted, all of which failed to delete the partition.
i bet they were doing something wrong in those, such as “write new partition table to disk ? type yes” and they simply hit y or something similar. i always reboot the system after messing with the partition table to ensure the changes stick. in any case it was faster to suggest the dd method above.
Dell’s typically have the Windows activation onboard so you don’t have to worry about remembering a serial. The company i work for works almost exclusively on Dells and i’ve never had to input a Windows activation key.
All the major OEMs do it: