Windows Office Hours: May 16, 2024

As an MSP, we have our clients do the "wipe". Either through Intune (they may as us to do this for them), or users do it themselves through the company portal app. This solves all challenges: removes all company (and possible personal!) data and brings the PC back in to factory default, a known and defined state. Some clients use Autopilot, which then re-deploys for the new user. But even without Autopilot, new employees typically have a fresh work environment within 20-30 minutes after going through OoBE. None of our customers re-image and I would HIGHLY recommend against it - especially on mobile devices. OEMs invest a lot in mobile PC images so they are tuned for energy efficiency and security. Any image you provide will likely break something and/or ruin the user experience. If you're concerned about the bloatware many OEMs pre-install on their devices: wipes often remove that, because they don't include it in their recovery partitions. (thank goodness). Alternatively, use the "Fresh Start" option in Intune if your Supplier includes their bloatware in the recovery image. Ask your PC supplier for business PCs with "vanilla" Windows images. All OEMs offer it as an option, sometimes for free. But remember, removing bloatware costs money because it subsidizes the purchase price. Or get Surface. 😉