If you’re looking to customize your Windows experience, navigating through the myriad of settings can often feel like a treasure hunt. Display settings reside in the Settings app, while color calibration is tucked away in the Control Panel. Services can be accessed via services.msc, and scheduled tasks are found in taskschd.msc. Group policy is hidden behind gpedit.msc, which is notably absent in Home editions. The frustration mounts when many desired adjustments still require diving into regedit, often leading to tedious searches for the correct paths. This convoluted setup can be exhausting.
Since the introduction of Windows 8, the Settings app and Control Panel have coexisted, yet they often clash over ownership of features like sound, networking, and storage. Microsoft has acknowledged the challenges of eliminating the Control Panel, citing a humorous yet sensible concern: the potential disruption of decades-old printer and network drivers. To address these frustrations, I developed my own utility that streamlines access to the diagnostics and tweaks I frequently use. This single Avalonia window allows me to manage my Windows installation more efficiently, without the need for cumbersome searches or external programs.
Initially conceived as a PowerShell-only tool for friends seeking troubleshooting assistance, this utility has become a running joke among my peers, with one even dubbing me “Google” on Discord for my knack for providing quick solutions. However, I wanted to elevate the experience beyond a simple PowerShell script. After exploring WinUI 3 and Avalonia, I settled on the latter, despite some limitations with FluentAvalonia. The result is a lightweight, visually appealing program that meets my needs and is entirely open source, available on GitHub for others to download, run, or enhance.
One application covers what fifteen panels normally do
The application opens to an overview page featuring key metrics: DNS latency against public resolvers, system uptime, pending reboots, and accumulated temporary files. These indicators provide immediate insight into the system’s health. Below the overview, a sidebar organizes various functionalities, each corresponding to common tasks performed on Windows. The Health page offers checks on the PC’s status, including Windows version, activation status, Secure Boot, TPM, Defender, BitLocker, updates, drive health, CPU, memory, GPU, battery, firewall, and a quick event-log scan from the past 24 hours. The Network page details DNS health, active adapters, Wi-Fi profiles, listening ports, and a DNS profile switcher, allowing seamless transitions between Cloudflare, Google, Quad9, AdGuard, and DHCP without navigating to the network adapters page.
Additional pages encompass services, scheduled tasks, drives, drivers, power plans, gaming toggles, privacy settings, and the taskbar intricacies of Windows 11. Each section is designed for practicality, featuring per-row buttons for Start, Stop, Restart, Enable, Disable, and Run actions, along with a filter box for easy searching. The primary goal of this application is to consolidate frequently used tweaks into a lightweight graphical interface, eliminating the need to search for registry paths or PowerShell cmdlets.
Every check is a PowerShell script, and every tweak is JSON
The C# shell is intentionally streamlined. Each diagnostic on the various pages is a .ps1 file located in a Scripts/ folder adjacent to the executable. The C# layer’s sole function is to execute the script, read a JSON object from stdout, and display it as a colored tile on the relevant page. Each script generates a status (ok, warn, fail, or info), a title, a brief summary, and an optional details array for further insights. A Write-Result helper simplifies the process, allowing scripts to reuse it, while the runner captures the last parseable JSON line from stdout.
This structure enables users to open any script in the Scripts/Network folder, such as dns-health.ps1, in any text editor to understand the latency test’s mechanics, modify the resolver list, and rerun it. Users can also execute the script directly from a PowerShell prompt to receive the same JSON output as the application. This transparency ensures that no hidden processes operate on the system without user awareness. If users prefer the scripts but not the C# or Avalonia interface, they can easily adapt them to a new wrapper. The toggle pages for Gaming, Privacy, and Taskbar and Shell function similarly, utilizing a JSON manifest at Manifest/tweaks.json to manage registry paths and values generically.
Every change writes a .reg backup before it touches anything
One critical aspect of this tool is its commitment to transparency regarding registry changes. Each script that modifies the registry accepts a -DryRun switch, returning a JSON structure with a plannedChanges[] array. Before applying any changes, the application displays the current versus next state for each registry value affected by the toggle.
The backup process creates standard .reg files, formatted like those from the Registry Editor’s exports. These backups are stored in %LOCALAPPDATA%WindowsControlCenterBackups, with timestamps for easy identification. Before writing new values, the code captures existing ones, ensuring that any changes can be cleanly reverted. If a value did not exist, the backup records this as a comment, maintaining clarity in the restoration process.
This meticulous approach means that if the application encounters issues or users decide to discontinue its use, reverting registry changes is straightforward. Users can double-click any .reg file in Explorer, allowing Windows to restore values independently of the utility. An in-app revert button offers the same functionality, executing reg.exe import on the file. The “Applied” page lists all active tweaks, each with a button to execute the corresponding .reg file. The underlying ledger, stored in a flat JSON file at %LOCALAPPDATA%WindowsControlCenterapplied.json, provides a clear overview of the application’s understanding of the system’s state.
It’s not a debloater, and it never will be
While I appreciate the value of custom debloating tools—essential for a clean Windows 11 installation—this application is not designed for that purpose. Instead, it focuses on tweaks that I would manually apply to a standard Windows installation, ensuring they can be reverted cleanly. Examples include enabling Hardware-accelerated GPU Scheduling, restoring the classic right-click menu in Windows 11, hiding the Widgets button, and adjusting telemetry and advertising-ID settings.
The program is intentionally lightweight and minimalistic, lacking a settings panel, tray icon, scheduled scans, or notifications. My goal was to create a tool that provides essential functionalities without the burden of extensive features. While it offers useful tweaks for clean installations, it serves primarily as a background utility for monitoring system health. Users can quickly assess DNS performance or manage startup applications without replacing the Settings app or Control Panel. This tool aims to consolidate frequently used controls into a single interface, complete with a documented history of changes and straightforward reversion options. Microsoft may maintain the coexistence of the Settings app and Control Panel, but this utility empowers users to access the controls they care about in one convenient location.