The other day I got a request from a customer to enable the Windows Aero interface on their linked clone VDIs. Personally I do not see any benefit in doing this (on the contrary), but apparently some users really like it, they even say they “need” it.
Due to the optimizations I do on the golden image, the necessary services to enable Windows Aero are not enabled by default. Windows Aero also requires that the Windows Experience Index score has been determined.
To enable Windows aero, run the below commands on your non-aero golden image with an elevated command prompt:
sc config uxsms start= auto sc start uxsms sc config themes start= auto sc start themes winsat formal -restart
REG LOAD "hku\temp" "%USERPROFILE%\..\Default User\NTUSER.DAT" REG DELETE "hku\temp\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System" /v Wallpaper /f REG ADD "HKU\Temp\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\VisualEffects" /v VisualFXSettings /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f REG UNLOAD "hku\temp
REG ADD "HKCR\Directory\Background\shell\Aero OFF \command" /ve /t REG_SZ /d "sc stop uxsms" /f REG ADD "HKCR\Directory\Background\shell\Aero ON \command" /ve /t REG_SZ /d "sc start uxsms" /f
The first two lines will enable and start the “Desktop Window Manager Session Manager” service
The next two lines will enable and start the “Themes” service
The fifth line established the Windows Experience Index score and runs a full set of assessments (this takes a couple of minutes)
The next four lines enables back the wallpaper and sets the visual effects to “Best performance” for the default profile.
The last two lines are optional and will add two context menus when right-clicking the desktop so you can easily enable/disable the Windows aero interface