Windows 8.1 Guest account and Metro apps problem

arachnaut

New Member
Power User
Messages
282
Location
Sunnyvale, CA USA
Hello,

I volunteer to help maintain a set of computers for members of the local senior center. We have a small lab running mostly Windows 7, one station is running Linux, one is a Mac and the last runs Windows 8.1 with a touch screen.

Yesterday we got a new computer donation and we uninstalled the Windows 8.1 and moved it to the new computer.

It behaves differently and I don't know what happened.

These computers all run Windows with Guest account enabled and the visitors use that account.

Previously, the Windows 8.1 computer had a variety of metro apps on the guest start screen, but after the uninstall/re-install, now the Guest start screen is very minimal with only the most basic things on the Start screen and no Metro apps to speak of (just the Store, IE, File explorer and desktop, if I recall correctly).

That previous installation was originally running Windows 8.0 for a while before we upgraded to 8.1 Update. We had a few of the basic metro apps in guest mode, like Bing, Camera, News, Finance, etc.

This time we immediately ran the update to 8.1 and 8.1 Update and never started up the guest mode until all the updates we made.

It seems that the Guest account behavior has changed quite a bit and we can no longer demo any of the apps in Guest mode.

Moreover, it seems that we would need a Microsoft account for the guest just to be able to install any of the apps.

I'm not sure what changed or why, but it would be nice if we could demo the apps for guests, otherwise they can only use the desktop.

In both cases we had only an administrator local account and guest account - no Microsoft accounts.

Any ideas on how to enable a few Metro apps for guests?
 

My Computer

System One

  • OS
    Windows 8.1 Pro with Media Center (64-bit)
    Computer type
    PC/Desktop
    System Manufacturer/Model
    Custom-build
    CPU
    Intel Core i7-2600K @ 4.3 GHz
    Motherboard
    ASUS P8P67 PRO Rev 3.0
    Memory
    16 GB G.SKILL Ripjaws X DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (4 banks 4GB DIMM DDR3 8-8-8-24 5-32-12-7 1T 1.5V)
    Graphics Card(s)
    NVIDIA GeForce GT 440
    Sound Card
    Firewire Focusrite Saffire Pro 14
    Monitor(s) Displays
    LG W2353V
    Screen Resolution
    1920x1080
    Hard Drives
    2 of Seagate Barracuda XT ST32000641AS (2TB ea.);
    1 of Seagate Barracuda Green ST2000DL003 (2TB);
    1 of Hitachi Deskstar HDS722020ALA330 (2TB);
    2 of Seagate Desktop ST4000DM000-1F2168 (4TB)
    PSU
    Corsair AX850 Gold
    Case
    Cooler Master HAF 932 Advanced
    Cooling
    ThermalTake Silent 1156
    Keyboard
    Logitech K520
    Mouse
    Logitech M310
    Internet Speed
    7Mbps
    Browser
    Chrome
    Antivirus
    Kaspersky
    Other Info
    Event Studio Precision 6 powered audio monitors;
    Boston Acoustics CS Sub 10 Powered Subwoofer;
    NI Kore controller;
    NI Maschine controller;
    M-Audio Axiom 61 keyboard controller; expression pedal; sustain pedal;

    ... and tons of audio software ...

    I also keep two USB 3 thumb drives (A: and B:) attached with boot recovery and security stuff that I can boot into from BIOS in case of emergency
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