Performing a fresh setup of Windows might leave some unnecessary software installed.
Performing a fresh setup of Windows might leave some unnecessary software installed.
You've recently found some unwanted software on your Acer laptop. It seems a bloatware program named Acer Explorer has been installed. This usually happens when you upgrade to a newer version of Windows and the installation process doesn't remove all unnecessary files. Have others experienced this issue with Windows 10?
There is an option to automatically install drivers on the setup pages. Uncheck it - it was there in windows 8. It maybe a separate option but its buried in the custom pages somewhere.
OEM license key available, but I performed a fresh setup of Windows 8.1 using a flash drive. That drive likely didn’t contain Acer Explorer files (or if it did, it probably included all extra software from various OEMs). I’m assuming the Windows installer reads the key and fetches the necessary bloatware from Microsoft servers.
I restored Windows 7/8/8.1/10 several times on my HP laptop recently. Each time I did this, I used a formatted flash drive from my main system (which was also built from scratch) running Windows 10. The only software ever installed was the default 8750m drivers for Windows 8. During setup, I never downloaded anything on the laptop, even when using "express settings." The only chance I thought it might install unwanted apps was if someone had logged into my Microsoft account or synced their apps, so when I signed in again, it tried to reinstall them.