I'm in the process of rolling out custom Windows 11 images and doing some user testing ahead of a deployment in September. Everything has been going smoothly until I got to the OOBE stage. When I try to trigger audit mode by pressing Ctrl+Shift+F3, it doesn't seem to work at all. I've tried multiple times, but I just get stuck at the OOBE. I can still access audit mode from the desktop, but that's not ideal. I even wiped the VM and tried installing a different edition, but the issue persists. Has anyone else run into this problem?
5 Answers
This might be part of Microsoft's efforts to block certain OOBE bypass methods, like "oobebypassnro". Starting with 24H2, they might have made changes that prevent skipping OOBE as easily as before. It's frustrating, I know!
I was using an older uupdump image from November 2024 of the same edition. After wiping the VM and installing it, Ctrl+Shift+F3 worked perfectly. Looks like there might be differences in how different versions of the image handle OOBE.
Why stick to creating master images? Automated installations like Autopilot can save you a ton of hassle. When you need to update something in the future, you just swap out the installer instead of having to recreate everything every time.
Funny enough, I experienced something similar. I tried various shortcuts like Ctrl+Shift+F10 and Windows Key + R, but they didn’t work at first either. After restarting the OOBE process and hitting Ctrl+Shift+F10, it actually worked! Might just be a glitch.
I've heard some users report similar problems with specific new ISOs. It’s a bit maddening, honestly, but sometimes it’s just one of those quirks with new versions that we have to deal with.
Yeah, it seems like a really short-sighted move, especially for large-scale deployments. It just complicates things.