ApexPulse 11

Windows 11 Gaming Optimizer with Privacy Shield, Rollback & Reports

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Safe by default. Competitive by choice. Restore when needed.

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What It Does

ApexPulse 11 is a PowerShell/WPF optimizer for Windows 11 gaming PCs. It ships two curated profiles, an integrated privacy shield, full registry backup with one-click rollback, and timestamped HTML reports — all behind a modern dark-themed UI.

Formerly Win11 GameBoost / ltsc-setup. Same repo, new identity.

Maintainer note: see docs/backend-tweak-review.md for the backend flow, tweak-by-tweak review, and Safe vs Competitive profile recommendations.

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Screenshots

Dashboard	Privacy Shield	Rollback Center

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Features

Category	Highlights
Profiles	Safe Performance (zero-compromise gaming) and Competitive (privacy + noise reduction)
Privacy Shield	Tailored experiences, diagnostic data, Cortana/cloud search, location tracking, activity history
Rollback	Full registry backup + Windows restore point before every apply; one-click restore from any backup
Reports	Timestamped JSON + HTML reports written to %ProgramData%\ApexPulse11\Reports
Packages	Installs gaming essentials via WinGet (Steam, Discord, Xbox App, 7-Zip, and more)
LTSC	Bootstraps WinGet and Microsoft Store when missing on LTSC builds

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Quick Start

Open PowerShell as Administrator:

Set-ExecutionPolicy -Scope Process Bypass -Force
.\ApexPulse.ps1

This launches the WPF GUI. For headless / automation usage:

# Analyze (read-only scan)
.\ApexPulse.ps1 -Profile Safe -Mode Analyze -NoUi

# Apply Safe optimizations
.\ApexPulse.ps1 -Profile Safe -Mode Apply -NoUi

# Apply Competitive (includes Privacy Shield)
.\ApexPulse.ps1 -Profile Competitive -Mode Apply -NoUi

# Restore from a backup
.\ApexPulse.ps1 -Mode Restore -BackupPath "C:\ProgramData\ApexPulse11\Backups\20260524-143000-Safe" -NoUi

Legacy entry points

Both legacy files still work:

.\setup.ps1 -Profile Safe -Mode Apply -NoUi
.\GameBoost.ps1 -Profile Safe -Mode Analyze -NoUi

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Profiles

Profile	When to use	What it does
Safe Performance	Default for almost everyone	Enables Game Mode, disables GameDVR, activates high-performance power plan, tunes MMCSS, enables HAGS, prefers exclusive fullscreen, disables Game Bar overlay, disables power throttling, and installs gaming packages.
Competitive	Opt-in for leaner, privacy-hardened gaming sessions	Everything in Safe plus: consumer suggestion reduction, visual effects reduction, toast suppression, SysMain/WSearch/DiagTrack service management, and the full Privacy Shield.

Safe Performance is designed to stay compatible with Microsoft Store, Game Pass, Windows Update, Defender, Firewall and anticheats. Competitive is still fully reversible, but more opinionated.

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Optimization Matrix

Area	Safe	Competitive	Notes
Game Mode	Yes	Yes	Enables Windows Game Mode for the current user.
Background recording	Yes	Yes	Disables GameDVR background capture.
Power plan	Yes	Yes	Activates Ultimate Performance when available, with High Performance fallback.
Multimedia scheduling	Yes	Yes	Tunes the Windows Games MMCSS profile. Reboot recommended.
HAGS	Yes	Yes	Requests hardware-accelerated GPU scheduling. Driver support decides behavior.
Exclusive fullscreen	Yes	Yes	Prefers exclusive fullscreen mode to bypass the DWM compositor.
Game Bar overlay	Yes	Yes	Disables the Game Bar overlay to eliminate micro-stutters.
Power throttling	Yes	Yes	Disables CPU power throttling for peak frequency.
Packages	Yes	Yes	Installs gaming essentials with WinGet.
Consumer suggestions	—	Yes	Reduces Windows suggestions and widget noise.
Visual effects	—	Yes	Disables transparency, animations and Aero Peek.
SysMain	—	Yes	Stops SysMain and sets it to Manual.
Windows Search	—	Yes	Stops WSearch and sets it to Manual.
Diagnostic tracking	—	Yes	Stops DiagTrack and sets it to Manual.
Notification toasts	—	Yes	Suppresses toast notifications.

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Privacy Shield

The Privacy Shield is integrated into the Competitive profile and also available as a standalone panel in the UI.

Feature	Admin Required	Detail
Tailored experiences	No	Disables diagnostic-data-based personalization.
Diagnostic data upload	Yes	Reduces telemetry to security-only level.
Cortana & cloud search	Yes	Disables Bing results in Start Menu and Cortana consent.
Location tracking	Yes	Denies location access system-wide and per-user.
Activity history	Yes	Disables activity feed collection and upload.

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Safety & Rollback Model

1. Analyze mode does not apply changes — it is always read-only.
2. Apply mode requires Administrator for system-level optimizations.
3. Before applying, ApexPulse automatically:
   • Exports every registry path touched by the selected profile.
   • Snapshots individual registry values (to detect and revert newly created keys).
   • Captures service start modes and states.
   • Attempts a Windows System Restore Point.
4. Backups are stored under %ProgramData%\ApexPulse11\Backups.
5. Restore from the Rollback Center tab in the UI, or via CLI:

   .\ApexPulse.ps1 -Mode Restore -BackupPath "<path-to-backup-folder>" -NoUi

6. Reports (JSON + HTML) are written to %ProgramData%\ApexPulse11\Reports after every run.

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What It Does NOT Do

ApexPulse 11 does not disable Defender, Firewall, Windows Update, Core Isolation/VBS, Secure Boot, TPM, anticheat services, or driver security features automatically. Those choices affect security, game compatibility and system support too much to hide behind a button.

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LTSC Notes

Windows 11 LTSC can miss components that normal Windows 11 installs already have. packages.dsc.yaml keeps the package baseline separate and repeatable through WinGet Configuration/DSC. If WinGet is missing, Apply mode attempts the same App Installer bootstrap path this repo originally used for LTSC, then runs wsreset.exe -i so Microsoft Store packages such as Xbox can resolve through msstore. If that fails, install Microsoft App Installer / Microsoft Store manually and run ApexPulse again.

Apply the package baseline manually:

winget configure -f .\packages.dsc.yaml --accept-configuration-agreements --accept-source-agreements

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Files

File	Purpose
ApexPulse.ps1	Main UI, CLI, tweak engine, privacy shield, backup, restore and reporting.
GameBoost.ps1	Legacy redirect wrapper (forwards to ApexPulse.ps1).
setup.ps1	Compatibility wrapper for the old project entry point.
packages.dsc.yaml	WinGet Configuration package baseline.
.github/workflows/release.yml	CI: lint PowerShell scripts and build release zip on tag.

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Building & CI

The project uses a GitHub Actions workflow that triggers on new tags:

git tag v2.0.0
git push origin v2.0.0

The workflow will:

1. Lint all .ps1 files with PSScriptAnalyzer.
2. Bundle the project into a downloadable ApexPulse11-<tag>.zip release artifact.

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Official Windows Features Used

• WinGet Configuration / DSC
• Optimizations for windowed games
• Auto HDR
• Power mode

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License

MIT.