I took the time to read all posts in this thread, and I'm glad I did it, because it helped.
After that update, my PC was indeed a lot slower: Flash games running CPU to max, tiles so slow to appear, etc.
My PC is old (2013), but worked like a charm before this update (it's all SSD with a GTX 1060 NVidia card, and 16 Gb of RAM, and a high-end i5 processor of late 2013).
So, what I did (disclaimer: I'm an IT engineer, despite my old PC, lol):
- I upgraded all the drivers (including chipset and Realtek sound) of my MSI Z87-G45 GAMING Motherboard
from 2013. And also the NVidia driver. All that clearly helped, but not 100 % of the issue was resolved.
- I removed Edge. And also plenty of Microsoft software I don't use: Windows Store, etc.
It is possible to remove Edge, a user posted the right links:
https://lifehacker.com/how-to-uninstall-edge-chromium-when-windows-10-wont-let-1844297854Virer Edge
And I blocked further Edge updates, following the hint posted earlier in this thread:
You can block Edge update by making the following tweaks to the Registry:
Open Windows Registry editor.
Navigate to the following path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft
Right-click the Microsoft (folder) key.
Select New.
Click on Key.
Name it ‘EdgeUpdate’ and press Enter to save changes.
Right-click the new ‘EdgeUpdate’ key that you just created and select New.
Click on DWORD (32-bit) Value.
Name it ‘DoNotUpdateToEdgeWithChromium’ and press Enter.
Double-click on DWORD and change the value from 0 to 1.
Click on ‘OK’.
Reboot.
I am not sure that step helped. Who knows. But that's useful for the future anyway. Skype went to the bin last month, because of the "Share with Skype" added in all context menus. Microsoft is now behaving too aggressively.
- I adjusted the paging. I doubt it helped.
- That step helped: I noticed an "Antimalware Service executable" (related to Windows Defender) in the task manager every time I accessed the tiles. Tiles were very very slow to appear: I got blue empty squares for 5 to 10 seconds, before
being able to see the app name and logo in every tile. I tried each and every trick, but to no avail.
So I contacted Microsoft support.
The first interaction was scary, the guy wanted me to install the update again: HELL NO. And to take control of my PC: NO. Then I got a good hint, though strange at first glance: to delete the registry key
DisableAntiSpyware in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows Defender
I added that key years ago since it was a trick that worked to get rid of Windows Defender (I use Avira).
So it's very strange (rebel customer bullying ?) that removing that key worked.
Now my tiles and the whole Aero Peek experience works as intended.
At times, I wonder if my computer is not a bit slower, but it's hard to tell. 100 % of the issue may be resolved now.
A big thanks to those who contributed to this thread.