AtlasOS is part of a group of modified versions of Windows, and according to its creators, it is specifically “designed for gamers”. It can also be used on less powerful hardware platforms thanks to the low requirements and elimination of some functions that Microsoft implements in the official version of the system.

This development is hosted on GitHub and claims to be a open source project. We put it in quotes because the main tool used to create it is NTLite, which is a closed source software just like Windows itself. Its source code is available to allow for its audits or modifications. Finally, the developers say they will provide a script to help users create their own operating system ISOs in the future.

AtlasOS features

The main goal of this MOD is to remove all of them “negative disadvantages of Windows” that could affect your performance in games or any task. for that Significantly reduces running processes. Compared to the standard version of Windows 10, the latest version of AtlasOS (0.5.2) reduces the number of running processes from 185 to about 35. It also significantly reduces RAM usage, from 1.5 GB to 600 Mbytes. The latency of the process, which the creators of this development call “sticky theme”, also drops from 3.09 to 2.55.

This version too disable mitigation implemented against security vulnerabilities in modern Intel (and AMD) processors, such as Specter and Meltdown, based on the principle that “If security mitigations reduce performance, they will be disabled”. As you know, the industry had to make these kinds of patches against side-channel vulnerabilities because they were critical to security, but yes, they did degrade the performance of the chips to some extent depending on the specific CPU model.

Other components are disabled in this development, there are telemetry functions of Windows and Bloatware that every user should check for performance, but also to protect the privacy of their data. More questionable may be other types of tools that this AtlasOS also removes, such as Trusted Platform Module (TPM), BitLocker, Windows Defender, voice recognition, RAID configuration, storage configuration, restore points or system reset functions.

The developers explain that these components are not crucial to the execution of video games, so they eliminate them in search of the lightest version possible, which frees up resources for its main use. The modifications suggest that this lightweight version may be optimal for running on machines with lower hardware levels.

how to install

Installation is similar to official Windows 10 or GNU/Linux distribution, creating bootable media over the ISO image provided by those developers. You can also virtualize the image to see what this variant has to offer, although you won’t be able to tell there if the performance benefits they promise are true, and it would be ideal to do a clean install from scratch:

• Download the ISO image from the project’s GitHub page or the official website.
• Use Rufus (or another media creation tool) to create the installer.
• It is ideal to use a USB flash drive with at least 8 GB of space.
• Use any partition scheme you like, the most modern GPT or the most compatible MBR.

And a little more. Once the boot media is created, place it in the BIOS as the first boot device and from there you will install it as usual with the official version of Windows 10. Please note that this type of installation is not supported by Microsoft, although it can be activated with the appropriate license. Also make it clear that these are unofficial custom versions, which in this case reduce security features and other internal tools compared to the official ones. We’ll leave you with an installation video in case you dare to try it out.