The Windows 11 Setup is similar to Windows 10. While there’s a sleek new interface, the setup questions remain relatively the same. The basic setup is all based on personal preference. One thing to look out for when upgrading from 10 to 11 is you will lose your Start Menu custom layout. This will be very upsetting for a small fraction of users. Be prepared to recover their old Start Menu layout from
C:Users%username%AppDataRoamingMicrosoftWindowsStart MenuPrograms
You can also get this through right-clicking a start menu shortcut and selecting “open file location” but it will not tell you the shortcuts that were pinned from the previous profile. Please make notes before upgrading.
Important File/Folder Locations
Desktop, Documents, Pictures, PSTs, and other databases like Quickbooks are always top of mind when migrating data. I suggest retaining the old computer 90 days before destroying the drive. Make sure the user is actively looking for all potential data that could be lost after those 90 days. The Windows backup post provides more detail on critical data and backup procedures.
New Computer Setup
I prefer to start a new computer with a local admin account before connecting a separate user account related to an organization to Azure AD. For me, the local admin account is one more tool in the tool belt for when you are challenged but permission and login issues. Others may opt to create the profile based off the Azure AD account right off the bat. This will guarantee the Azure AD user has local admin rights.
How to elevate a user to local admin
The GUI interface for allowing this action appears to be removed in Windows 11. The easiest way (assuming you only need to elevate the user on a single machine) is by command line:
net localgroup administrators /add AzureAD<email_address>
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/devices/assign-local-admin
Other Notable Features Missing in Windows 11
Tiles have been removed. The start button has shifted to the middle of the task bar and the start button features have limited with the upgrade. You can’t resize or group tiles. Tiles simply don’t exist. You will have to migrate your start menu shortcuts and the document folder shortcut because that’s been removed too. Finally, while recents is a main feature for recalling any recently used file. You can right click a Word, Excel, whatever shortcut and recall the last document.
OrganizationName-DT-XX
OrganizationName-LT-XX
How would you like to setup this device?
I prefer to use a local admin account first under “set up for personal use” window. We “set up for work or school later” once we load the desktop profile.
Want to be safe than sorry? Choose “sign-in options” for creating a local account. You can always add a Microsoft Azure AD account later.
Select “offline account” and create a user account called “LocalLogin” and handoff the generic password to your IT team. The password will ultimately be changed to a complex password. A password management program such as Bitwarden will assist with generating a complex password.
The Desktop
Please make sure you make your user’s environment as usable as possible by unpinning the unnecessary shortcuts and pinning the most used apps.
Windows 11 Setup Summary
While Windows 11 is no ME, I’m not sure I would call it an upgrade either. It just a change in UI. Nothing more, nothing less. However, I think it did fix my sleep mode issues. I give the upgrade 5 stars if it did in fact fix that issue. My laptop refused to sleep sometimes.
