Over the last couple of months several people who rely on my computer savvy to clean their computers out of bloatware have purchased new computers, one from Dell and another from Acer.
Both of these computers have their own login backgrounds supplied by the computer manufacturer. As well as the regular desktop wallpapers - but they're easy enough to change yourself. Changing the login screen back to how Microsoft intended it to be is slightly more challenging.
You'll need to use the registry editor to change it back. To do this you'll need to be logged into an administrator's account.
Click Start
- Type regedit into Start Search and press enter and elevate the application
- You'll want to make your way to the following key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Authentication\LogonUI\Background
- From there, you should be able to see an entry called OEMBackground
- Double-click it, and in the window that pops up change the 1 to a 0 (zero)
- Press OK, and reboot your computer
After following those steps the computer should display the default login screen.
For those not comfortable with editing the system registry, download the registry file here, and run it. When prompted accept the request to merge with your computer's registry.