Debloating: ASUS Armoury Crate

As usual in the modern days, many vendors have started to ship unremovable bloatware with Windows. And unfortunately Microsoft happily forcefully installs it on your System, no matter if you blacklist the "Update" or the "Device". So we'll have to take matters into our own hands, and wrangle some semblance of control and performance back. ASUS is no exception to this, installing bloatware that behaves similar to malware.

This bloatware installs a number of Services, Scheduled Tasks, and even a fake Driver. Testing revealed that removing these Services made the System significantly more responsive, and even eliminated significant frame stutters during gaming. The downside was that some of the "hardware" buttons are wired to custom keycodes, instead of actual keycodes, so they only work with the bloatware. This is an acceptable cost, as I don't really use those keys anyway.

⚠️ Warning ⚠️

These instructions are provided with no warranty or guarantees of any kind. By using these instructions, you agree that you are responsible for all damages resulting from following these instructions. To be on the safe side, you should make a backup of critical data - everything is possible.

Disabling ASUS Armoury Crate

It is relatively simple to disable the components of the bloatware, thereby rendering it effectively useless. This solution has the same effect as removing it fully, and will not trigger Windows Update to reinstall it. Additionally this way things can be somewhat reverted if you ever decide you need this bloatware again.

Uninstall the Armoury Crate app

As usual with debloating, first remove the Software and all its side-components normally. This prevents files being left around that aren't necessary, and may even interfere with normal behavior. Once you've done that, continue with the next step.

Disabling the remaining parts

To make things simple, the following command will disable all parts that are known to remain after removing everything the normal way. This way you will end up with a similar result as if you did not have an ASUS Armoury Crate enabled system.

# Stop and disable Services
Get-CimInstance -ClassName win32_service |
?{ $_.PathName -match 'asus' } |
ForEach-Object {
	Write-Host $_.Name
	Get-Service $_.Name | Set-Service -StartupType Disabled | Stop-Service
}
# Stop and disable scheduled Tasks
Get-ScheduledTask -TaskPath "*asus*" | ForEach-Object {
	$_ | Disable-ScheduledTask
	$_ | Stop-ScheduledTask
}
# Disable the fake Device
Get-PnpDevice -FriendlyName "*Armoury Crate*" | Disable-PnpDevice -Confirm:$false

Run this as Administrator in a Powershell Terminal

Fully removing ASUS Armoury Crate

If disabling isn't your thing or not enough, and you never plan on running Windows Update again, then you can remove all traces of this bloatware. This will be irreversible, and can potentially target more than you intended - depending on how much "functionality" ASUS is going to bundle into their firmware.

Uninstall the Armoury Crate app

Uninstall the remaining parts

To make things simple, the following command will remove all parts that are known to remain after removing everything the normal way. This way you will end up with a similar result as if you did not have an ASUS Armoury Crate enabled system.

# Stop, disable and delete Services
Get-CimInstance -ClassName win32_service |
?{ $_.PathName -match 'asus' } |
ForEach-Object {
	Write-Host $_.Name
	Get-Service $_.Name | Set-Service -StartupType Disabled | Stop-Service
	sc.exe delete $_.Name
}
# Stop, disable and delete scheduled Tasks
Get-ScheduledTask -TaskPath "*asus*" | ForEach-Object {
	$_ | Disable-ScheduledTask
	$_ | Stop-ScheduledTask
	$_ | Unregister-ScheduledTask -Confirm:$false
}
# Disable the fake Device
Get-PnpDevice -FriendlyName "*Armoury Crate*" | Disable-PnpDevice -Confirm:$false

Run this as Administrator in a Powershell Terminal

Uninstall the "Driver"s

This step is optional, as Windows will simply re-install it with the next update thus rendering all our efforts nil. So unless you know of a way to block fake driver updates, or never intend to update, you can safely skip this step.

pnputil.exe /enum-drivers |
Select-String -Pattern "asussci" -Context 2, 5 |
ForEach-Object {@{
	"Inf" = ($_.Context.PreContext[1] -split ':')[1].trim();
	"ClassName" = ($_.Context.PostContext[1] -split ':')[1].trim();
}} | ForEach-Object {
	pnputil.exe /delete-driver $_.Inf /uninstall /force /reboot
}

Run this as Administrator in a Powershell Terminal. If you missed a step, this may reboot your system.

License

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:

Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
Neither the name of the copyright holder nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS “AS IS” AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT HOLDER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

Permalink 17 Feb 2024