Windows SteadyState helps make shared computers easier to set up and maintain for administrators, and more reliable and consistent for computer users. By using Windows SteadyState, you can more effectively:
- Defend shared computers from unauthorized changes to their hard
disks.
- Restrict users from accessing system settings and
data.
- Enhance the user experience on shared computers.
These capabilities make Windows SteadyState beneficial in situations where a computer is used by multiple people, such as schools, public libraries, community technology centers, and Internet cafés.
A unique challenge exists for shared computer environments. Microsoft software is designed to offer users a great degree of flexibility in their ability to customize their experience and to make changes to their computer settings. However, in a shared computer environment, administrators will typically not want to provide the full set of customization and change capabilities because doing so could allow changes to be made that affect the health of the computer and the experience for other users. On a shared computer, privacy and uniformity are very important elements of the maintenance and use of the system. Windows SteadyState helps an administrator protect a shared computer against unwanted changes.